SANDY LONG

poet-photographer

In an age of little human connection despite constant contact, the arts are our greatest cohesive. The immediacy of both the poem and the photographic image can lessen the chasm between our human and cultural differences, and poet-photographer Sandy Long has built a life upon both.

Her talent is deeply anchored in the inaudible songs of nature and her effortless ability to unearth layers of wisdom and observation. As a poet, she makes her own paths on the hunt for beauty, and like all great poets, dares to meet death eye to eye to find its shimmering center. As a photographer, she preserves secrets of the seasons and what often goes unnoticed by passersby. As a creative artist using both mediums, she shows us the world through her inner lens, and we come away deeply nourished and privy to what lies in the underbrush of daily life.

It is pure delight to present Sandy Long, in her own words, followed by links to her books, website, blog, inspiring videos, photography, and creative series. Enjoy!

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Q: Your poetry, in many ways, gives voice to the soul of nature and the human soul within that greater soul. What is it about the natural world and our place in it that ignites your inspiration with such immediacy?

A: I experience the natural world as a portal to deeper understanding of the self. I exist within it, and it exists within me.

Q: When did you begin writing poetry—how old were you and what prompted this creative shift?

A: I’ve been writing poetry since early childhood. My parents filled a folder with some of those youthful stabs at the page—humbling as they are now. Poetry has remained an essential creative outlet for me ever since.

Q: How has your life experiences affected your work- and how has your work affected your life?

A: They are entwined. Our lives are the material we are given to explore this time and our place within it. I’m particularly entranced with impermanence and how it is experienced in nature and through our human and cultural filters. This drives my efforts on the page and behind the lens.

Q: In an age when poetry is a near-forgotten art and in a time when poetry is watered down so much that few traces of excellence remain, what urges you to continue to lift your pen and your voice?

A: As long as they have something to say, poets will always give voice. I am no exception. Poetry is an act of love and at least for me, something I can’t not do. As an example, one of my poetry collections, “A Heart, She Said,” probes love, loss and relinquishment, and a coming to terms with self. I needed to give voice to that exploration.

Q: As a poet and a photographer, what is life like through your lens? Do you see everyday things in metaphor and do the two disciplines overlap in your internal process?

A: Poetry and photography are both tools and my silent partners. With their aid, I see and am shown. My parents gave me a simple camera when I was very young, and I’ve never been without one since. In recent years, I’ve felt the need to step away from words somewhat and toward images, allowing them to speak for me. But my most meaningful work, in my opinion, combines the two. One example can be seen in my most recent show, “Portal of Place,” which explores the interplay between human nature and the natural world.

Q: Without confining it to a definition, what is poetry to you personally? Give us sensual snapshots of what poetry is to your poet’s heart.

A: Poetry is death at your doorstep, where the feathered one has fallen from its fatal strike against the glass that belied entrance. It is the froth and foam of birth and waterfalls, the measure of memories, the cadence of carefully crafted words with weight and heft enough to pin one in place—against the white wall, atop the dark earth so eager to enfold this temporary shroud we think of as self. It is hope—and the absence of hope—heart and heartlessness—prayer and breath.

Q: Both poems and photographs are snippets of time that become timeless. As a poet and visual artist, what do you like to catch in your net, so to speak?

A: I like to catch what wants to be caught—that which presents itself when I make myself available—by putting pen to page, by heading out with camera, by making it possible for portals of experience to open to me. I’m most engaged when wandering and pondering. I’m drawn to things that increase my awareness of wonder. Since 2013, I’ve been sharing images of the wonders all around us through a series called Wonder Watch. It’s my form of prayer and gratitude for the incredible gifts of nature that are always there, but often go unnoticed.

Q: What is one of your favorite words and why?

A: “Notitia.” The dictionary defines it as “a register or list,” but I have my own meaning for it. (We poets allow ourselves such liberties!) For me, notitia refers to the particularities of a place, which sparks the fire of our interest in what is special about the places we love.

Q: If you could step inside any poem and live there, what would you choose?

A: “The Leaf and The Cloud,” a book-length poem by Mary Oliver described as an “unforgettable poem of questioning and discovery, about what is observable and what is not, about what passes and what persists.” It is all that, and more. If I were to “step inside” it, as you asked, I might not return.

Q: If you could have an afternoon tea with kindred souls, what poets from history or the modern age would you invite?

A: Although I do like tea, I confess to a love of coffee. That said, I’d be thrilled to consume either with Mary Oliver so we could probe that poem and its endless layers—or any of her works. Maybe Sara Teasdale and Elinor Wylie for their ebullient sensuous appreciation of the natural world. Stanley Kunitz, so he could read to me, “The Old Darned Man,” in the reflective voice of his final years. William Blake, for a dip in the mystical. And Galway Kinnell, for his robust celebration of the richness of our sensual bodies. I had the pleasure of spending a week at a poetry workshop with Galway, where we shared a poetry exchange centered around the word, “frisson,” a “special shiver of delight,” –a word worth turning in the mind. There are so many more poets (and photographers, many of whom are visual poets) I’d be eager to spend time with, but I would be devoting the rest of my days to drinking coffee and tea!
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And on her recent accomplishments as the first Artist-in-Residence at Shenandoah National Park in Virginia and Artist-in-Residence at the Delaware Highlands Conservancy’s Lemons Brook Farm in Bethel, New York:

“In each residency, and in my work throughout the Upper Delaware River region, I have focused on the wild beauty and artful nature of place. I shoot with the eye of a photographer, the attention of the naturalist and the heart of a poet, bringing openness to the process and a desire to share the beauty of image and story. I immerse myself in a place and its notitia to gather its story through an ongoing “conversation” that is heavily influenced by sensory interface. In doing so, I gain a deeper understanding of who I am.”

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Poems

FINALLY, SPRING
..
Wind gathers
at the back of my throat,
sends the leaves
in skitterish rush
past lips parted
for the telling—

how stream has
forgotten
winter’s fist
at her throat—

unfettered voice emerges
one note at a time
in rivulet and
spark-flecked runnel

sun strums
rising strands of grass
and coaxes open
shuttered hearts

while hands with
unfurled fingers
gather blossoms.

EARLY
..
Before the drone from the road,
before the going and doing,
before the rising up—

there is hush—

and the prayer of stillness,
and the bear that has stirred,
and the bird already leaping.

In old clothes and yesterday’s sweat,
we gather green and golden light,
greet the bluet and the violet,

drench in dew and watch the dogs
stitch the marshy sedges,
paws needling perfection

and its reflection.

Beyond,
emptiness scores the horizon.

MENEMSHA
..
You remember--
not a single place to eat--
but odors of the sea kept us searching.

How was it
we ended up at the edge,
where bulkhead tried to teach water not to breach
what we wanted preserved?

Kelp, with its bubble-pouches blistered on the sand,
gulls smearing drizzly sky with cries of
indescribable desire—

or sorrow—

or was it longing that held us there,

mesmerized by the lapping of that boat,
like a heart thumping against
its breast-cage?

The quahogs came steaming
in that banged up bucket,
the birds, streaming closer
to improve the odds
of chance and possibility.

Again and again, we lifted
the springy muscles to our chins,
buttering their slide to oblivion.

Such rich taking,
then tossing
remainders
to the flock that gathered like devout congregants,
those witnesses wearing feather-shawls
to the altar.

I remember, too,
and toss this prayer

…

Prose:

DISCUSSION
..
We wander out the door at dusk for a final prowl before the light fully fades. I am looking, listening, opening my senses to what this place is saying. We form our bonds in such conversations.
Buddhawg settles on a nearby knoll, silhouetted against the darkening sky. The patience of a senior dog is one of their generous gifts. A peaceful spirit another. At 14, his sense of hearing nearly gone, Bu sniffs the air for answers, scenting unseen molecules that offer clues.

I aim the lens, probe this portal to deeper awareness of how it goes here.

A crescent moon begins conversing with the poet-tree that's flung its form in a forward flump, drama and torment co-mingled. Each holds the other in its thrall; I crawl on belly to observe what's being said.

The darkness deepens, tree becomes jagged line, dog is shadowed shape protruding from the grass. Moon mounts her stage. We are audience, partners, participants in something happening beyond what we see, when suddenly, the silence is knifed with sound.

Rippling cackles of coyote enter the conversation, filtering from the fringe of forest that begins where the clearing concludes. They are on the run, coming closer, clearer, when a pack across the road declares its presence.

Yodels ricochet around us as I lie there with lens, gathering in, growing colder, taking up what's offered, imagining how it will go when they emerge in a rush from the dense inky brush, flow across the open land, past a woman and a dog, entwined with tree and moon in a twilight embrace, engaged in a deepening conversation about place.

Website

Books:

A Heart, She Said

IS

SANDY LONG

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poet-photographer