I'VE MOVED!

My blog site, still called "Field Notes," is now part of my brand-new website lindabuckmaster.com. Everything new will be posted there, but you can still read my older posts here. I will also be posting my Audio Essays on the website under the Media tab, and events, news, and upcoming classes will be there as well. And, you can learn about my hybrid memoir that will be published in November 2018 by Burrow Press, Space Heart. A Memoir in Stages. Hope to see you there!

"Stonework"

(Local marble in a road embankment, Evoramonte, Portugal)

Stonework

            (After Dudley Zopp’s “Geologics”)

I.

It’s much quieter now. Boulders lie peacefully. A gentle wash of slate litters the hillside. Tree roots caress granite outcrops like old lovers, while igneous and metamorphic sleep together in erratic lineage, allowing lichen decades to creep across their backs. Lumpy ridges, glacial till dotted with ponds and marshes, eroded roots of volcanic chains -- permeable or impermeable, but all waiting for exactly nothing.

II.

Dappled across each individual stone, and together spread out in pattern, speckled tableau, three shades of gray, maybe a pink, some brown or tan—dappled memory.

III.

Throw them farther, farther, each satisfying plunk or plink its own music, song of boys and the bored, the nervous conversation, the rocky frustration. Throw another stone, a composition complete and pleasing.

IV.

What stories laid here, this northern wall fitted to keep out or in some something, or maybe just to get the damn things out of the way, or maybe no stories at all, only the stony work of hard silence.

V.

Go deep enough, you run into a stone.

VI.

We didn’t have stones there. Florida sand, coral reef, coquina rock, limestone not too far beneath the surface: porous, all porous. Something was missing.

VII.

So basic. So useful. So often in the way.

VIII.

Every spring a new crop, winter gifts, glacial rubble, tumble and heave. 

Writing Poetry on a Maine Island

Poetry on a Maine Island: 

 A Writing Workshop

July 26-29 (three nights) 
Registration by May 15

There is nothing like an island for writing. Come to Whitehead Island located on Muscle Ridge Channel at the entrance to Penobscot Bay to experience a classic Maine island and Lightkeepers house with time to explore, write, and relax. Maine islands have a long tradition of inspiring poets of all kinds and Whitehead is a special place for inspiration. 

Travel by private boat from Spruce Head, eight miles south of Rockland. Stay in the renovated Lightkeepers house and enjoy wonderful meals. Explore the deep spruce woods and the granite outcroppings down to the sea. 

·      Open to any poets and aspiring poets of any level who will write new poetry, experiment with form and style, and revise existing work if they have it. Small class size of 7 to 14 participants.

·      We will discuss readings on craft and the work of other poets for inspiration. We will hear about the history of the island and the mainland towns.

·      We will write in plein air among the nooks and crannies of the island and in cozy spots in the Lightkeepers House.

·      Other activities include a guided walk of the island led by Whitehead Island staff, boat ride of local waters, and lobster bake.

Linda’s classes maintain a safe, supportive environment that recognizes there is no such thing as a mistake in writing, just the next draft. For more info and to register, contact 

http://www.whiteheadlightstation.org/2018-writing-workshop.html

Location

Whitehead Light Station is located on Whitehead Island, which is about 8 miles southwest of Rockland, Maine, about 3 miles northeast of Tenant’s Harbor and directly off the coast from Spruce Head. The Emery's Wharf parking and embarkation point is about a two-hour drive from Portland, Maine and just over four hours from Boston. It is about 45 minutes south of Camden and 15 minutes from Rockland and the Owl’s Head airport. Detailed driving directions are sent with acknowledgement of program registration.

Click on the maps below to enlarge:

Audio Essay Collection

The Audio Essay Collection so far. Per requests, I am posting all the links to my audio essays that I've done so far. On my new website, which should be ready soon, they will be housed in their own section. All were recorded for the program "Esoterica" on the community radio station WERU in Orland, Maine. All are under 5 minutes. Thanks for the interest!

"Radio Waves" 3/20/18
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2018/03/esoterica-112117-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2/

"Rough Fabric" 2/13/18
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2018/02/esoterica-112117-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2/

"My Husband's Being Deployed on Tuesday" 1/2/18
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2018/01/esoterica-112117-2-2-2-2-2/

"Wise Women" 12/5/17
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2017/12/esoterica-112117-2/

"Bus to Dolores Hildalgo" 11/7/17
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2017/11/esoterica-11717/

Audio Essay -- "Radio Waves"

"Radio Waves"

   This is an excerpt from my forthcoming book, Space Heart. A Memoir in Stages. It was originally broadcast on community radio station WERU. By the way, the photo above is from the Saguaro National Forest outside of Tuscon.

https://s3.amazonaws.com/weru/archives/2018/esoterica-20180320.mp3

The cover mockup for my hybrid memoir

Space Heart. A Memoir in Stages

Photomontage artist Joan Proudman did the cover art http://joan-proudman.squarespace.com. The launch will be November 2, first in my town of Belfast, Maine, then on to Florida, home of my publisher Burrow Press https://burrowpress.com  --- and beyond.

It’s 1962, one year after Alan B. Shepherd became the first American in outer space. This year, John Glenn orbits the earth three times, the first communications satellite, Telstar, is launched, and sea turtles once again come ashore as they have for millennia to lay their eggs on wild Florida beaches just miles from Cape Canaveral. In the spirit of the go-go time and place, eleven-year-old Linda Buckmaster becomes one of the first children to successfully undergo open-heart surgery using the recently perfected heart-lung machine.

In this hybrid memoir, Linda weaves into her story as the daughter of a rocket engineer the juxtaposition between cutting-edge technology and the natural world on the empty barrier island that came to be called the Space Coast. That contrast is written on her own small body as surgeons work to correct a congenital heart defect. Encountering more of a problem than they or Linda’s parents anticipated, they improvise a solution using materials developed for the space industry.

Alternately lyrical and narrative, the book moves forward to later years when Linda begins to reflect on the events of those times and the meaning of her experience.

Audio Essay: "Rough Fabric"

 First broadcast on WERU on February 13, 2018. Click the small MP3 button to hear it.
https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2018/02/esoterica-112117-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2/

Poetry on a Maine Island

 

Poetry on a Maine Island: 

 A Writing Workshop

July 26-29 (three nights) 
Registration by May 15

There is nothing like an island for writing. Come to Whitehead Island located on Muscle Ridge Channel at the entrance to Penobscot Bay to experience a classic Maine island and Lightkeepers house with time to explore, write, and relax. Maine islands have a long tradition of inspiring poets of all kinds and Whitehead is a special place for inspiration. 

Travel by private boat from Spruce Head, eight miles south of Rockland. Stay in the renovated Lightkeepers house and enjoy wonderful meals. Explore the deep spruce woods and the granite outcroppings down to the sea. 

·      Open to any poets and aspiring poets of any level who will write new poetry, experiment with form and style, and revise existing work if they have it. Small class size of 7 to 14 participants.

·      We will discuss readings on craft and the work of other poets for inspiration. We will hear about the history of the island and the mainland towns.

·      We will write in plein air among the nooks and crannies of the island and in cozy spots in the Lightkeepers House.

·      Other activities include a guided walk of the island led by Whitehead Island staff, boat ride of local waters, and lobster bake.

Linda’s classes maintain a safe, supportive environment that recognizes there is no such thing as a mistake in writing, just the next draft. For more info and to register, contact 

http://www.whiteheadlightstation.org/2018-writing-workshop.html

Audio Essay: "My Husband's Being Deployed on Tuesday" plus more

 "My Husband's Being Deployed on Tuesday"

I've taught in the University of Maine System for 25 years, both live classes and on-line ones. This audio flash essay was broadcast on the show "Esoterica" by community radio station WERU.   It was inspired by an e-mail sent to me by one of my students. You will need to click the tiny MP3 button under the title.

https://archives.weru.org/esoterica/2018/01/esoterica-112117-2-2-2-2-2/


"Security Clearance" 

In other news, I forgot all about this: My essay, "Security Clearance," is coming out in an anthology about Florida to be published by the University of Florida Press this March! It was so long ago that I was first approached by the editor Jim Ross about including my piece in "In Season: Stories of Discovery, Loss, Home and Places in Between." You can pre-order it through Amazon, but, of course, I prefer you ask your local independent bookstore to get it for you.  https://www.amazon.com/Season-Stories-Discovery-Places-Between/dp/0813056950/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1515881710&sr=1-1&keywords=jim+ross+in+season

If you'd like to read the entire essay first published in Burrow Press you can see it here: http://burrowpress.com/security-clearance-linda-buckmaster/. And here's the opening line:

“Wait here. I have to put my knives in the car to get through Security,” my brother Ric says.

"Flowering"

And last, but certainly not least, my little poem "Flowering" was read this week on Maine Public Radio by Maine Poet Laureate Stuart Kestenbaum https://mainearts.maine.gov/Pages/Programs/Maine-Poet-Laureate. You can hear it at mainepublic.org under "Poems From Here." This poem has had a life of its own and has been around the block a few times. Now, if it would only send home money  . . .

A Poem for the New Year

Return

Where the Passy meets the Bay, we come together,

gathering like ducks at Solstice: 

Barrow’s Goldeneyes down from Hudson’s Bay,

here once again in sight of the old bridge,

bobbing  and drifting, each small bird complete

but always swimming near to one another.

We, too, drift in this bright stream,

floating a life, returning to light.

Note: The Passy is the local nickname for the Passagassawekeag River that empties into 

Penobscot Bay at Belfast, Maine. It's 4:22 pm, and I think it is a bit lighter this time of day than it was two weeks ago.