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DEADLINE FOR OB PRIZE CHANGED

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 08:06:07 -0800

Attention, attention! The deadline for the Obsidian Prize in nonfiction has been pushed back 2 months. The new deadline is April 12th and the winner will be published in the fall issue, not the spring. All else stays the same. Two more months to hone those essays. Good luck one and all. See our OB Prize page for details.

HDJ 2011 Nominations for the Pushcart Prize

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 17:14:59 -0800

High Desert Journal is happy to announce our 2011 nominations for the Pushcart Prize. Congratualtions to the following:

From Issue #14 published Nov. 2011

In Poetry: "Gap-Tooth Girl" by Melissa Mylchreest. Winner of the Obsidian Award for Poetry.

In Poetry: "Sanctuary" by Cecelia Hagen

For Fiction: "The River Ranch" by William Kittredge

From Issue #13 published May 2011

For Fiction: "Enough of Me" by Joe Wilkins. Winner of the Obsidian Award for Fiction.

For Nonfiction: "Motherhood’s Unlikely Soundtrack" by Jennifer Ruden

For Nonfiction: "Richard Arizona" by Laurie Stone

Congratualtions all.

And The Winner Is...

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 09:37:54 -0700

Congratulations to Melissa Mylchreest of Missoula, Montana, winner of this year’s $1,000 Obsidian Prize in poetry. Melissa’s poem, Gap-tooth Girl was chosen from over 550 entries from 200 poets. This year’s judge, Oregon Poet Laureate, Paulann Petersen, says of the poem: “With a sashay of marvelous music “The Gap-tooth Girl” two-steps down the page. Who could resist this word-tune about a girl whose “hips have/ land in them,” who spins and turns “like a fence-caught feather/ in a gale”? Who would want to be able to resist the artfully rough-edged twang of this compelling poem?”

Melissa’s writing has also appeared in Big Sky Journal, High Country, News, Ranch & Reata and on Montana Public Radio. She received an MS in environmental writing from the University of Montana where she is currently pursuing a MFA and where she teaches poetry, literature and composition. You can read “Gap-tooth Girl” in the print edition, out in November, as well as the back story about how the poem came to be, here on the web edition, also to be out in November.

Once again, Congratulations Melissa.

Video of OB Prize Judge Paulann Petersen reading

Wed, 29 Jun 2011 10:33:06 -0700

For all you poetry fans out there, Poets and Writers recently posted a link to High Desert Journal's Obsidian Prize in Poetry judge Paulann Petersen reading her poem "Replenish". The video also features the poem set to music by Portland, Oregon, ensemble Flash Choir.

High Desert Journal is currently accepting entries for its Obsidian Prize for Poetry, poetry inspired by the West. All forms are accepted, from "free verse to haiku to cowboy," and the winning poet will receive $1,000 and publication in the magazine. Submissions are accepted only via Submishmash, and the entry fee for three poems totaling no more than 100 lines is $12.00. The deadline is August 15. We are looking for writers working in or inspired by the West, Big Sky or big city, send us your best work.

To see the video of Paulann reading you can go to the link below and then click on "related content" on the right side of the page:

http://www.pw.org/content/contest_seeks_poems_of_the_west_big_sky_or_big_city

Obsidian Prize in Poetry

Wed, 01 Jun 2011 12:51:12 -0700

HDJ is happy to announce that this year the Obsidian Prize in Poetry will be judged by Oregon Poet Laureate, Paulann Petersen. Paulann was featured in our winter 2010 issue and is a former Stegner Fellow at Stanford University whose poems have appeared in many publications including Poetry, The New Republic, Prairie Schooner, and Wilderness Magazine. She has four chapbooks--Under the Sign of a Neon Wolf, The Animal Bride, Fabrication, and The Hermaphrodite Flower. Her first full-length collection of poems, The Wild Awake, was published by Confluence Press in 2002. A second, Blood-Silk, poems about Turkey, was published by Quiet Lion Press of Portland in 2004. A Bride of Narrow Escape was published by Cloudbank Books as part of its Northwest Poetry Series in 2006. Kindle was published by Mountains and Rivers Press in 2008. Her latest book, The Voluptuary, was recently published by Lost Horse Press.

The Obsidian Prize for Poetry

Through a literary prize, High Desert Journal aims to explore the realm described by poet Jarold Ramsey: "I believe in an ecology of story, memory and imagination as much as an ecology of land." As an organization focused on a specific place, we at High Desert Journal have discovered that a deep hunger of readers, writers, and artists exists for place-based arts and literature. We believe every place has an ecology of story, memory, and imagination that inspires us, connects us to one another and to a place. We want to offer the best of this "ecology" through the Obsidian Prize.

2011 Obsidian Prize for Poetry
Judged by Oregon Poet Laureate, Paulann Petersen
$1,000 prize and publication in the High Desert Journal
up to 3 poems. 100 line max.
$12 entry fee
Deadline: August 15, 2011
For writers working in or inspired by the West, Big Sky or big city. Send us your best work.
Submissions are only accepted via SubmishMash. http://highdesertjournal.submishmash.com/Submit

High Desert Journal celebrates 6 + Years of Publishing

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 21:11:40 -0700

High Desert Journal celebrates 6 + Years of Publishing

Bend, OR – A release party for issue #13 will be held Saturday, May 7 from 4-6 pm at Atelier 6000. Featured at the celebration is #13 cover artist, Bobbie McKibben and, photographer, Barbara Michelman both from Missoula, Montana. Original works by both artists will be on display and the artists will be present. At 5pm readings by #13 authors will begin and managing editor, Elizabeth Quinn, will announce the winner of the 2011 Obsidian Prize for Fiction.

“After a dozen issues, all of us involved with and dedicated to High Desert Journal are excited to share in celebrating #13 and the bright future of High Desert Journal,” said Managing Editor, Elizabeth Quinn. High Desert Journal #13 is packed with many of the best writers and artists in the West including Rick Bass, David James Duncan, Craig Childs, Mary Sojouner and Kim Stafford.

Food, beverages and music will also be on hand for the celebration of #13. Atelier 6000 is located east of Industrial Way, near the roundabout at SW Wilson and behind the ODS building.

Local HDJ Authors Reading at Friday Art Walk

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 19:53:06 -0800

The Nature of Words hosts High Desert Journal, Bend's very own literary and fine arts magazine.

Readings by local authors Anna Roberts, Nathaniel Dunaway, Carol Gift, & Fawn McManigal.

Editor, Charles Finn, & Managing Editor, Elizabeth Quinn will also be on hand.

March 4, 2011 / 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM / The Nature of Words / 224 NW Oregon Avenue

Oregon Book Awards

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 01:07:42 -0800

It's Oregon Book Award time again and you can vote for your favorite. The Oregonian and Literary Arts are sponsoring a Readers' Choice Award. It's a strong field this year, as always, and we're proud to say a few HDJ contributors are on the list. To see the list and vote follow the link below. Winners will be announced Monday, April 25th at the Gerding Theater in Portland.

http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22BS2G78ZM8/

HDJ Pushcart Prize Nominees

Fri, 28 Jan 2011 19:05:45 -0800

HDJ has nominated the following contributors for inclusion in The Pushcart Prize: Best of the Small Presses XXXVI.

Nathaniel Dunaway, Speak, harsh land, issue 12

Jane Carpenter, What a Blossom Knows, issue 12

Gretel Ehrlich, Moon, issue 12

Maya Jewell Zeller, Because Chunks of my Brother Were Falling From the Sky, issue 11

Joe Wilkins, Bull Mountain Elemental, issue 11

Congratulations all.

Robert Micheal Pyle Comes to Dinner

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 19:04:18 -0800

HDJ Hosts Bob Pyle to Dinner

My wife said she saw a little Jerry Garcia. I hadn't got past St. Nick. Regardless, it was a wonderful evening and High Desert Journal was happy to host Robert Michael Pyle "Bob Pyle" to dinner last week. Elizabeth cooked, I baked bread, and Bob with his white mustache, beard and hair, and ample (sorry Bob) belly, entertained. Besides my wife, Joyce, there was Elizabeth's partner, Ed, and Jay and Theresa Bowerman, Jay the naturalist at the Sunriver Nature Center. Gathered at Elizabeth's with the Deschutes River sliding by just outside in the dark, dinner seemed the least we could do, Bob's pair of fine poems appearing in the current issue of HDJ #12.

Bob is perhaps best known for his six books on butterflies, including the Audubon Field Guide to North American Butterflies, as well as his ecological and philosophical, Wintergreen, winner of the John Burrough's Medal, and his long running column in Orion "The Tangled Bank". Bob was in town to give a talk at the COCC campus and promote his newest book, Mariposa Road: The First Butterfly Big Year, the event being put on by the High Desert Museum

Bob rolled in around 7:00 pm. That afternoon he'd been out to the museum to see the live butterfly exhibit (up until March, a must see) and say hello to Ochoco the bobcat, Snowshoe the Canada lynx, and Thomas the otter. Talk immediately turned to previous otters at the museum that Bob had known and Jay had "baby sat". Over hors d'oeuvres Jay told us some stories of the early days at the museum and early otter enclosures that weren't up to otter intelligence and resulting in a number of escapes that the museum (being in its infancy) kept secret from the press. Bob admitted to a long fascination with otters and showed-off his ring, a wedding ring from a previous marriage that his current wife, Thea, generously allows him to wear on his right hand. The ring is a silver band with the image of an otter engraved on it. It should also be reported that Teresa presented Bob with a small magnetic butterfly which Bob attached to the side of his glasses. It came in a handsome home-made paper box and Bob wore it the whole time as we snacked on appetizers.

It was immediately evident that Bob is one of the most kind-hearted and congenial people you could met. His knowledge of butterflies, and nearly all aspects of natural history, is impressive, but there was never the feeling of being lectured to. He listened equally as well as he spoke and the conversation, somewhat surprisingly, only briefly touched on butterflies. Instead talk pooled around such topics as the advent of social media and amount of time children spend (or rather don't spend) outdoors in nature. Bob mentioned an important book on the subject, The Last Child in the Woods, by Richard Louv, its subtitle Saving our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder something none of us at the table had suffered from in our youth. Related to this it wasn't surprising to learn that Bob doesn't watch TV, and hasn't since the mid-sixties, but he admits to falling victim to its addictive powers from time to time, especially when forced to stay in hotel rooms on his book tours. We also talked at length about the title "nature writer" often bestowed upon Bob and others. Many writers in "the Canon" Bob says reject this term, while others have decided to embrace it. Bob didn't come down hard one way or the other, but talked about how nearly all literature can be thought of as nature writing if looked at that way. He mentioned Moby Dick which is taught in many nature writing classes, but no one would ever think to define (confine) Melville to being solely a nature writer. He went on to talk about other books, urban-based, that are full of references to nature. The question that most occupied us, however, and the answer that most eluded us, is where are the new up and coming nature writers? Where is the 20-year-old Pyle, Lopez, Terry Williams, Thoreau? Who is out there celebrating nature? Is all nature writing issue oriented these days? Is nature writing morphing into blogs and rants about environmental devastation? A lot of quiet surrounded these questions, and we came up no names of anyone under 40 writing in the field. It was odd, and a little concerning, almost disturbing. We consoled ourselves with ice cream.

The evening did have to come to an end, and despite the serious nature of much that we talked about there was a good amount of laughter too. Bob had plans in the morning and at the talk the next night we learned he spent the better part of Saturday walking along Mirror Pond watching the ducks. His talk was a slide show of his year researching Mariposa Road, and he signed books afterward. I had him sign my copy of Chasing Monarchs and then had the temerity to ask him if he was a butterfly, "What butterfly would he be and why?"

Overall, it was great meeting him, a great dinner and talk, and if you're out there reading this Bob, I'm still waiting for an answer.

--
Charles Finn, Editor
High Desert Journal
P.O. Box 7647
Bend, Oregon 97708
406-239-1519

Breaking the Back of the Grim Stuff, a lecture by Barry Lopez

Fri, 12 Nov 2010 09:43:35 -0800

Barry Lopez talks in Bend

If you have only read Barry Lopez and never met him, it would be easy to imagine a soft-spoken, avuncular figure, an aging naturalist as much concerned with the world as he is with living deeply and well within it, someone gentle with the shortcomings of others, forthcoming about his own and attuned to the vagaries of fate – and you would not be wrong. Barry, if I may, was in Bend last week for the annual Nature of Words festival, five days of literary indulgence. On Friday night he spoke before a sold-out audience at the Tower Theatre, and then the next morning he was at the COCC campus for what was supposed to be an intimate gathering of 12. Unknown to him the number had expanded to 40. I watched as he accepted the news with aplomb, then turned to me and graciously allowed me to become #41.

Before the lecture began Barry asked me to remove the computer monitor from the desk at the front of the classroom. He said he found it visually distracting, both for himself standing behind it and he imagined for the attendees facing him. It was a simple procedure to disconnect, but my hunch is there was something more to the request. A number of times during his talk Barry made reference to computers distancing us instead of connecting us to the world. “We can fill this room with information,” he said at one point, meaning the resources from the Internet, but it's how we use the information, the humanness we bring to it is what matters is what he wanted to impress upon us. He also mentioned as I was unplugging the wires that he doesn't use a computer and instead types his manuscripts on an electric typewriter, an IBM Selectric I believe. I set the monitor on the floor, thinking that Barry Lopez is probably one of only a handful of writers that can get away with shunning technology these days. (Wendell Berry and Paul Auster being two others I can think of.)

Barry stands ever so slightly stooped over, shoulders curving in, head hung just a tad forward – the classic writer's slouch. No doubt this is from decades spent hunched over the typewriter, but also I imagine from a life spent examining the ground: stopping to examine the content of animal scat, watching salmon spawn, pondering a calligraphy of tracks left in the snow. Barry opened his lecture by asking us to ask ourselves what the purpose of our writing is? Why do we want to write? Is it an artistic endeavor? Is it to contribute to something larger than ourselves? These are questions all writers ask themselves over and over again, but it is the depth of their soul-searching, the willingness not to be scared of the answer that set different writers apart. He also read a short passage from Marge Piercy's famous poem To Be of Use and said that writing is work and that we should be “gutted” when done.

A person can teach the technical side of writing, at least in part he said, but they can not teach discipline and desire. Writing is about pattern making Barry stressed at different times during the talk, and compared a story to an ecosystem. Everything must be related to all the other parts, including the music of the piece. The music of your language he said is what makes your language memorable. He also had a word to say about the recent explosion of memoirs which he said were often really autobiographies. The fact that you might remember there were two back doors to your childhood home when in reality there was only one is unimportant compared to what the doors represented for you and what happened when you passed through them. One thing to remember when writing a memoir he told us is not what happened to you, but how you responded to it. On a separate topic he said we should interview people we are not comfortable with. What is the nature of your love and compassion for strangers outside your frame of reference he wanted us to ask ourselves.

Beauty was a theme that came up throughout the lecture. Making language memorable and beautiful – and being true to your readers. He said you need to take a vow to respect the readers. Along the same lines he later said that it is the story that is wise, not the writer. He mentioned the famous opening from Moby Dick, “Call me Ishmael,” and how that invites the reader in, asks them to come along with the author as he or she takes them through the story. He threw in an anecdote about walking with Russell Banks and saying, "I want to be the reader's companion," and Banks saying, “Yes! That's it! To be their companion.”

Near the end of the talk Barry told a story about a place in Australia where they are shipping incredible amounts of iron ore to China. The sky is a poisonous red there, he said, and the water unsafe to drink. People are advised to bathe or shower once a week for no more than 3 minutes. He paused to let that sink in. When the silence was sufficient he held up a sheaf of poems in his left hand. The room was compeltely still. Although he had already told us he's not an advocate, you know where his heart lies. “You can break the back of the grim stuff,” he said, “with this,” and waved the poems back and forth, like a victory banner.

At the Nature of Words

Tue, 09 Nov 2010 13:36:37 -0800

At the Nature of Words

(Editor's note: The Nature of Words is an annual five-day literary event here in Bend. This year the guest authors were Barry Lopez, Michael Dickman, Jimmy Santiago Baca, Anne Lamott, Hillary Jordan, Paulann Petersen, Kent Haruf, Brian Turner and David Whyte. HDJ board member Greg Druian was able to attend the Friday readings. Matthew Dickman, mentioned below, is Michael Dickman's twin brother and was a guest author at the 2009 Nature of Words.)

This year I was only able to attend the Friday night reading event at the Tower Theater for The Nature of Words festival. Still, it is clear that this literary extravaganza continues to be presented with real flair and organization, and that the participating writers have much to say that is worth hearing and thinking about.

First off, I would like to say how moving Michael Dickman’s poetry was. It was interesting to see Michael come on stage with gelled hair and odd dress, but at the same time read intimate, sometimes unbearably intense work. His appearance struck me as a reminder of how removed the reading and writing of poetry is from the daily experience of most people — myself included. Though I made a resolution two years ago to get re-involved with poetry, I haven’t done as well as I could, and yet I’ve got a terrific appreciation for the work of both Dickmans (Michael and Matthew). When I hear or read their work, I feel there’s something important going on. (I still haven’t gotten to that level with, say, John Ashbery.)

Barry Lopez was very stimulating as well; he is able to take his penetrating observations of the natural world around him and very easily and naturally expand them into profound insights concerning the entire world, and all humanity. I must say that although I have tried since I was young to develop a sensitivity to and feeling of belonging with the rhythms and processes of the natural world, I have failed miserably to accomplish this. I still perceive myself as an outsider, and I feel no personal connection to “nature.” (Not that I lack enthusiasm for the beauty of our part of the world!) But thinking about this causes me to admire even more what Lopez does, as his relation to the natural world seems, well, so natural.

On a final note, as this constitutes my first ever blog, I want to share my impression that “blogging” is in no way easier than any other kind of prose (at least for me.) Your thoughts?

Where are the People?

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 20:46:04 -0800

Where are the People?

(Editor's note: At High Desert Journal we are often wondering why so few photographers submit work with people in it. What is it about the western landscape that excludes people from the camera's eye? Intern Krista Gower had this take on it.)

Why do people tend to send in pictures with no people in them? Could it be that we don’t think of ourselves as works of art? Do we see ourselves as oppressive beings who smother the real beauty in the world? More and more it seems we are obsessed with the virginity of nature, putting ourselves outside of it. But people are part of nature and I would argue our bodies and our minds are pieces of art to be considered.

Landscape photographs are also art and many would argue the natural world, as an archetype in our collective unconscious, is art (whether photgraphed or not) because it is created, created by a God, or Gods (depending on one's beliefs) or the equally mysterious interworkings of science. Sunsets and mountains supposedly become works of art as soon as we click the camera. Granted, it can be intimidating at first to label something you’ve done as art, but it is easier to take that leap if you’ve taken a photo of nothing but a natural scene. In this sense a sunset is a painting you didn’t paint.

Everyone has a camera these days and taking pictures has become self-vindicating. In many peopele's mind in order to make art with a camera one needs to capture moments of the absence, taking photographs devoid of people and their technology. These images tap into a deep-seated idolatry of the untouched world. A road can be in the photo, but only if it is straight and empty. A building can be there too, but only if it is crude and falling down.

The desert is likewise venerated as a place of isolation. It’s like a deserted island except the land is the ocean. If there are people present in the image the scene just doesn’t feel very deserty. Perhaps a person could fit into our bias about the nature of the desert if it is only a single human, maybe walking very far off. We might be able to pull off an artistic desert photo with a person in it if that person were very old, ancient, withering, wrinkly and dried out. We also think of the desert as being in the past: fossils, hundred-year-old saguaros, sand made from centuries of wind against rock. If the desert is in the past, a person in the photo would ruin the effect. Even a hundred year old person is much younger than our idea of the desert.

An Audience with the Queen

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 09:48:36 -0700

Ursula Le Guin and Roger Dorband in Bend

Two contributors to issue 13 showed up in Bend at Camalli Books last Friday night, Portland's, Ursula Le Guin and her long-time friend and collaborator, the 6' 4”? photographer Roger Dorband. Tina Davis owner of Camalli's waved the two in from the parking lot, the towering Dorband teetering over tiny Le Guin like something from The Earth Sea Trilogy.

The two were in town to promote their book Out Here: Poems and Images from the Steen Mountain Country, a handsome collection of Dorband's photographs accompanied by poems and sketches Le Guin created concerning the Steens in eastern Oregon. A crowd of 30 or more listen to Le Guin as she stood leaning forearms on the back of the chair provided. She is, of course, the grandmother of west coast literature, publishing over twenty-one novels, eleven volumes of short stories, three collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and is the recipient of Hugo, Nebula, PEN-Malamud and National Book Award. She prefaced her reading saying, “I'm certainly glad to be back here on the east side,” referring to the west side of the Cascades as “the wetside.”

“You certainly have the most beautiful sky here in Bend,” she added

Le Guin read seven poems in all, including both that will be appearing in HDJ #13. She read deliberately, taking care to enunciate each word, and right from the start (and even before she arrived) the mood in the room was one of reverence and respect -- I couldn't help thinking we were being treated to an audience with the Queen. An old hand with all things literary she sat once she was finished and handed the floor over to Dorband

In addition to photographing in the Northwest, Roger Dorband has traveled extensively, creating bodies of photographs from Europe, Mexico, Egypt and India. His photographs are included in numerous private and corporate collections and in the collection of the Portland Art Museum. Dorband lives in Astoria, Oregon, and he and Le Guin collaborated on a similar project years before.

Some of the photos in this book were shot as far back as 1986, Dorband told us, but most he said were taken over the last five years. Very few of the pictures chosen have people in them, Dorband wanting the land to speak for itself. A number of the photos that didn't make it into the book he said were of his own shadow stretching over the ground or pressed against a building. One of the most difficult aspects of compiling the book was finding images that fit the mood of Le Guin's poems as neither artist wanted the photos to be illustrative.

Le Guins's sketches she herself called amateurish, and when asked in the question period that followed why she chose to include them she said in making them it allowed her to see deeper and more fully into the landscape and that having them in the book might encourage other people to attempt to keep a field journal and draw as well. When I spoke with both artists afterward I thanked them for allowing HDJ to use the poems and images and both offered they would be happy to send us more work in the future and if they could be of any help to the journal to let them know. I understood the latter to be both polite and truly serious, and I told them they had best be careful what they offered, “I might just take you up on it,” I said.

Gretel Ehrlich to Judge Obsidian Prize

Wed, 27 Oct 2010 15:30:44 -0700

High Desert Journal is proud to announce that friend of the journal and award winning writer Gretel Ehrlich has acceptend our invitation to judge the 2011 Obsidian Prize. The Obsidian Prize in Fiction is open to all writers working in or inspired by the West. Big sky or big city, send us your best work. Winner to be published in fall 2011 issue and recieve $1,000. Deadline February, 18, 2011. Submission accepted online only.

For those of you who don't know, Gretel is the author of 13 books including three books of narrative essays, a novel, a memoir, three books of poetry, a biography, a book of ethnology/travel, and a children’s book, among others. She has published in Harper’s, The Atlantic, The New York Times Magazine, Time, Life, National Geographic Magazine, National Geographic Adventure, Aperture, National Geographic Traveler, Architectural Digest, Orion, Shambhala Sun, Tricycle, Antaeus, and Outside, among many others. Her work has been anthologized in Best American Essays of the Century, Best American Essays 1988, Best Travel Essays, Best Spiritual Essays, The Nature Reader, Nature Writing and many others. She was a correspondent for NPR’s Day to Day and has reported from Kosovo, the Arctic, and Africa. Gretel also wrote and recorded a poem cycle in collaboration with the Siobhan Davies Dance Company at the South Bank Theatre in London, and was a founding member of the UK’s Cape Farewell artists and climate change project and contributed to Cape Farewell’s “The Ship” at the British Museum of Natural History in London on issues of climate change. And the list goes on, Gretel is the winner of many awards, among them, the 2010 PEN Thoreau Award, a Bellagio Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, the Harold B. Vurcell Award for distinguished prose from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts, and two Expedition Council Grants from the National Geographic Society for circumpolar travel in the high Arctic. Not only all this, but her new poem Moon appears in the upcoming issue of High Desert Journal, due out soon!

So send us what you've got. This is your chance to impress one of the best.

HDJ Visits Gretel Ehrlich

Wed, 27 Oct 2010 10:28:36 -0700

We turned off the pavement onto a gravel road and aimed ourselves at the Wind River Range. It was rural Wyoming, a handful of homes scattered at comfortable intervals and small bands of antelope fleeing along the ravines. By the time we reached Gretel's our tiny Toyota Yaris was bottoming out along the two-track, grass growing between wheel ruts carved out by full-sized pickups. Gretel lives appropriately, poetically -- literally -- at the end of the road, the Winds her backyard where she takes her daily walks. After a five-year hiatus of seeing each other there were hugs all around and then inside for dinner: grilled chicken, salad, beer and wine. A supply of sunshine from the day had been collected by solar panels and heated water for dishes, showers and lights. My wife and I slept in Gretel's bed in the large one-room cabin of square logs, no TV and windows in almost every direction. Gretel slept in her studio, a smaller version of the same just a few steps away but minus the kitchen and bathroom. In the studio, long planks along one wall serve as her desk and the bookshelves are crammed. That night after everyone was asleep the quiet was immense, and the dreams later on far reaching and relevant.

Coffee on the deck in the morning. A walk to a nearby lake in the afternoon. Then that evening we were invited to dinner at the Carney's, a nearby ranch on god-knows how many 1,000's of acres, the Green River passing through the middle of it. It is a beautiful homestead, and Freddy, our hostess, by far the most beautiful woman of any age I have ever come across. In her 70's (at a guess) she is as stately and elegant as a person can be, her southern charm and hospitality not having left her after her many years in the boondocks of Wyoming. A group of eight in all were gathered and it was a surprising mix of minds and liberalism, conversation revolving around colorful local characters and stories that should be, and maybe some day will be, in books. One story in particular stood out about a man who tack-welded of a pair of horses (the shoes of the front feet only so they could balance with their hind) to the bed of his flatbed so that he could drive them home. As we ate a lightening storm came up and the predictable jokes were made at Gretel's expense, all in good humor of course. These were all friends and the banter increased as the supply of wine decreased. Gretel has been hit twice as most know, and although not fond of lightening she is not scared of it either. Nevertheless she'll give a storm wide berth if possible, and does not tempt fate unnecessarily.

Sadly we had to leave the next day. There was a light rain in the morning as we scraped our way out her drive and back to the main road. But before leaving and almost as an afterthought I sprung the idea on Gretel of being the judge for the journal's 2010 Obsidian Prize. Out of kindness, as a favor no doubt, and because of her loyalty and belief in the need for small journals, she accepted. Thank you, Gretel, for that and everything else. It was a fine time and we hope it is not so long until we see you again.