Inflorescence - Marjorie Gowdy

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Résumé :
In Inflorescence: The Pasture at Rest Marjorie Gowdy immerses us in farmland and mountainside, with images and patterns timeless as the land itself. As she ambles among the chest-high Susans, or smells the Flattened streams of smoked ham reach toward the vale, she pulls us along with her. Marjorie writes the tender side of life, from bees and barn swallows to hands touching beneath the ivy tree, years wrapped around a patient poplar. Listen, too, for her condemnation of Man's callow disregard, both for the Earth and for each other. In A Murmuration Marjorie writes 'Tis not wit nor skill that keeps me alive, but wit and skill are certainly alive in her writing. I for one, dear reader, am grateful Marjorie Gowdy is sharing her wit and wisdom in these poems.-Pamela Brothers Denyes, Author, The Right Mistakes and The Widow's Lovers What a marvelous poet. Marjie Gowdy reminds me of the great Romantic poets, especially, John Clare, for she can name every flower and tree around her. She paints an indelible stamp. Only a seasoned florist and botanist could write powerful nature poems like these. She can be succinct and terse as Emily Dickinson. In thinking about her father in Inflorescent, she laments Flowers return. He does not. It reminds me of Emily who said I heard a fly buzz before I died. Buy this chapbook. It is worth far more than its listed price.-Maurice Ferguson, Poetry Editor, Artemis This book reflects the beauty of the natural world based on the knowledge and experiences of a seasoned gardener. The author treats every element nature as though they are old family friends. There is a kindness and appreciation of both the flora and fauna in the author's world that is captivating and inspiring. The writing is beautiful and takes the reader into a world rich in complexity and subtlety that makes this poetry compelling.-Peter Haslett Kelly, Poet and Composer

Biographie:
Marjorie Gowdy writes at home in the Blue Ridge mountains of Callaway, VA. Gowdy was Founding Executive Director of the Ohr-O'Keefe Museum of Art in Biloxi, MS, which she led for 18 years. Now retired, she worked in other fields that fed her love of writing, including as a grants writer. Her poetry has been published in the Roanoke Review (2015), Artemis Journal (2013-2022), Floyd County Moonshine (2021), Valley Voices (Mississippi Valley State University (2021), Indolent Books (2021), Clinch River Review (2021), Visitant-Lit (2021), RockPaperPoem (2022), the book Quilted Poems (2022), the Centennial Anthology of the Poetry Society of Virginia (2022), and in several national anthologies of poetry dedicated to the families of Ukraine. She has essays in Katrina: Mississippi Women Remember (2007). Gowdy also paints, with recent works accepted by the Virginia Beach Artists' Center (2020), illustrations published in Floyd County Moonshine (20210, in Artemis Journal (a visual poem, 2021), Orange Peel Magazine (2022), and in an exhibition at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine. Her poems + verse, which she calls carmen duca, were also part of an exhibit, Welcome to Roanoke, in 2022 at the Roanoke, VA, Municipal Building. Gowdy is a summa cum laude graduate of Virginia Tech and has a master's degree in liberal studies from University of North Carolina-Greensboro. Her work is informed by the tumbled Virginia mountains as well as her time on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and along the coasts of Virginia and North Carolina. She is newsletter editor for the Poetry Society of Virginia.