Carol Crawford, writer, poet, teacher and coordinator of the Blue Ridge Writers Conference held annually for over a decade, has published a poetry collection. The title is The Habit of Mercy, Poems about Daughters and Mothers. Those of us who have known Carol for a long time, have waited for this book. It is so like Carol to publish and say nothing about it. She is Hope Clark's example of "The Shy Writer."
Although her poetry and essays have been widely published, Carol only mentions it in her bio. She was facilitator for NCWN West Poetry Critique group in 1995 when I came to this area. She drove from Fannin County, Georgia to Tri-County College in Murphy NC the first Thursday night of each month to meet with our group. At the time, her county had no literary events or writing organizations. Like many in our area, she heard of NCWN West and joined. In her acknowledgements, Carol mentions Nancy Simpson, Janice Moore, Gene Hirsch and me, all members of NCWN West.
After a while, Carol began organizing groups in her county and with the help of Robert Kimsey, another poet, writing in Blue Ridge, GA found a home. Carol, with the backing of the Blue Ridge Mountain Arts Association, held the first Blue Ridge Writers' Conference in an elementary school in Blue Ridge. The conference brought in excellent instructors. Soon the elementary school was too small and Carol moved the event to North Georgia Tech, a community college in Blairsville. It was a perfect venue -- plenty of room for classes, for all attendees to gather for the key note speaker, and room for book sales. Circumstances caused the conference to move back to Blue Ridge, and now it is held in the building that houses the Arts Association.
It takes many volunteer hours to hold a quality conference like this every year. Carol and her committee pull it off without a hitch, or at least without anyone knowing if there is a glitch. April 5 and 6 are dates for the 2013 Conference.
As soon as I received my copy of The Habit of Mercy by Carol Crawford, I knew I wanted to write about it and share it with others. If you are a mother or had a mother, you will enjoy Carol's poetry about the joys and challenges of mothering two daughters, and about being a daughter, remembering her mother.
Read more about the book HERE.
Order a copy of Carol's book for only ten dollars. Contact her at: Carol.Crawford@gmail.com
It's a coincidence I should read this post now. I just finished working on a poem about how my mother's death effected me. I wrote the poem a year or so ago, and it was only about how she was diagnosed with cancer, how after six months she received a good prognosis which gave us hope, and how she died unexpectedly a week later.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this month's poetry challenge on Wilda Morris's blog which is to write about how a life changing event effected you, I knew what I had to do with this poem. I'll e-mail it to Wilda Morris and see if she'll put it on her blog. To read this month's challenge and find out how to submit your own poem, visit http://wildamorris.blogspot.com/
Abbie Johnson Taylor, Author of
We Shall Overcome
and
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
http://abbiejohnsontaylor.com/blog