Dirigo Bards & Their Old Graveyards

Are you an 811?

Are you too and 811?

Original image @ The Graves of Maine's Dead Poets

Untidy Candles: Reflections on a Tombstone

Wesley McNair Poems

Maine's new Poet Laureate has a website, where you can learn more about him and his work. He is the editor of the highly acclaimed "The Maine Poets: An Anthology" (The Google Books link has some free pages to view, but it is definitely worth buying).

His poetry has been chosen by former US Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser, for the American Life in Poetry series. Two of them are "For My Wife", and "The One I Think of Now".

You can also watch a great video from the Library of Congress, where McNair shared the dais with Maxime Kumin in a 2006 reading.

Colby College also has a video online called "My Life as a Poet" which is a 51-minute presentation he gives about his life. It includes slides and pictures from his early family life and items from his papers, which are collected at Colby Special Collections.

New Biography of Parson Fisher of Blue Hill

The folks at the Fisher House Journal have an interview with the author of a new biography of the amazing Mainer, Parson Jonathan Fisher.

On October 7th we'll be reading some of the poetry of Rev. Fisher in Blue Hill, as part of the Dead Poets Remembrance Day in Maine.

"Maine in Four Seasons" Belfast Poetry Reading 7-27

The Belfast Library is holding a special poetry reading on the 27th of July7 which will feature four poets from a new book titled “Maine in Four Seasons: 20 Poets Celebrate the Turning Year” (Down East Books) edited by Wesley McNair. Each of the participating poets has poems from a different season in the anthology and will read poetry about that season. Elizabeth Tibbetts will represent spring; Martin27 Stengesser, summer; Patricia Ranzoni, fall; and Kristen Lindquist, winter.

“Maine in Four Seasons” includes not only contemporary poets from around the state but a range of Maine’s earlier poets, from Longfellow to Robinson to Millay. The readers will sample some of the earlier work together with their own. The book’s illustrator, Jan Owen, will kick off the reading by showing some of her original work for the book and describing her creative process

A "new" dead poet: Samuel French Morse

While looking through the tremendous book, "Maine Lines," I came across a poet named Samuel French Morse. I had never heard of him before, and with a little research have come to see that he was a wonderful poet. I shall now look for his books in used bookstores.

He summered in Hancock, Maine, so he is the newest of Maine's dead poets to be placed on our map, though I was not able to find where exactly he was buried. He was born in the city of witches, the city of peace, in MA.

I found a nice memoir about him online, written by one of his former students.

Frederick Morgan : Blue Hill, Maine

Frederick Morgan
Originally uploaded by gravelight

Frederick Morgan was a poet and the founding editor of The Hudson Review. His wife, Paula, who is the current editor, maintains a website about her late husband.