Trish Olson (left) was the art editor and served on the poetry editorial board for Dust and Fire. Mary Sanders’ poem was selected for publication.
Mary Sanders is in good company. A Grand Marais resident, she was one of 48 women whose literary works were selected for this year’s edition of Dust and Fire,
an anthology of short stories, poems, essays, and artwork by women published in March by Bemidji State University.
One of the editors of the book was Trisha Olson, daughter of Greg and Mary Olson of Grand Marais and a 2005 graduate of Cook County High School. Olson earned a BFA in creative and professional writing from Bemidji State in December 2009.
Sanders’ submission was entitled Life Lessons from the Raspberry
Patch.
She is grateful to Joan Drury, local author, mentor, and owner of Drury Lane Books in Grand Marais, who has encouraged her as well as hundreds of other women authors. Drury formerly operated a writer’s retreat for women on the shore of Lake Superior and has sponsored numerous writing workshops, some of which Sanders has attended. “Without taking poetry writing workshops,” Sanders told the Cook
County News-Herald,
“I can’t believe I would have had a body of work from which to select submissions to the anthology….
“Three summers ago I participated in my first [writer’s workshop] because I was attracted by an inference to a therapeutic benefit in the course description. Taught by Ellen Kort, past poet laureate of Wisconsin, it (the course) began a new chapter in my life.
“So I must express my gratitude to Joan Drury for sponsoring these annual workshops with their outstanding instructors. They’ve given opportunity for participants both in poetry and prose to develop their skills. Also, the workshops are an economic benefit to the county because many if not most of the writers who participate live elsewhere.”
Two other contributors to Dust and
Fire
have participated in Drury’s retreats and workshops. One is Audrey Osofsky, a cousin of Sanders’ husband Doug, whose poem Playing Piano for a
Friend in Hospice
appeared in this year’s edition. Sanders credits Osofsky for encouraging her to submit her writing. The other is Julie Williams, who attended a Drury-sponsored poetry workshop last summer. Two of her poems, Blessing the Marigolds
and How We
Entered,
also made it into the anthology this year.
The stories and poems speak to many aspects of life: families welcoming babies, the tragedy of war, starting a job in a new city, watching a parent age, drinking in hot summers, wounds from old loves, faithfulness in lifelong loves, old rituals like watching movies while ironing, and the comfort of cats during hard times.
A writer named Emily Brisse described sipping sweet tea out of dainty teacups with her mother and grandmother. She spoke of her grandmother’s fancy hats and miniature china – “treasures that would remain as everlasting as a fairy tale spell.” She goes on to say, “Of course, I learned later that spells are always temporary, and that real women leaned not on magic but on their own earthborn strength.”
Deb DeNio Krueger wrote a poem called Autumn Winds,
sharing thoughts that some Northlanders might be feeling at this time of year:
Oh, I miss the warm sweet breezes of summer
Softly caressing my cheeks,
The rustling of quaking aspen leaves
And whispering of lively green grasses.
Now the icy cold fingers of autumn shove me
As they slap my red cheeks,
While crackling dry leaves drift
in the bleak gray air
And dying brown grasses moan.
The book is filled with thoughtful ponderings. At the beginning of the book, the Prose Editorial Board described the content well: “Within the pages of this year’s Dust & Fire,
women reveal the intimate chapters of their lives. Whether whimsical or sobering, these tales of endurance, severity, and grace glow with unforgettable personalities and genuine wisdom that simply move us. As Tami Mohamed Brown [one of the contributors] says, ‘There’s nothing – nothing – against which I can measure the remarkable size or shape of what lies inside….’ ”
Only a limited number of copies of the book were printed. Bemidji State does not have any for sale at this time. The university also publishes anthologies of literary works by men, high school aged writers, and Bemidji State students.
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