Highway 341 is a
generally north-south road in Baxter County in north central Arkansas. Its
approximately 34 miles of length (with extensions) meander in the Arkansas
Ozarks. The highway is also known as Push Mountain Road, and that’s the title
poet Pat Durmon has given to her latest collection of poetry – Push
Mountain Road (which
certainly sounds more interesting, and poetic, than Highway 341).
Comprised of 118
poems (and one introductory poem), the collection is a celebration – of people,
nature, relationships, the everyday, the small things (like making the crust
for a quiche), and the larger things (like sitting in a radiation waiting
room). Durmon combines an almost childlike wonder with the wisdom gained
through a lifetime of experience.
In this poem, an
observation about the declining afternoon light becomes something much more:
Open Doors
welcome
the failing
afternoon light
bellowing
bullfrogs
a spider
quilting
between porch
rails
a wood-wild road
zigzagging
up the mountain
a herd of deer
coming our
from dense
ragged woods
where they cross
a pasture
to go down to
the river
and catch grace
off guard
 |
| Pat Durmon |
It is that “something
much more” that characterizes Durmon’s poems. And the poem cover the landscape
that’s extends outward from Push Mountain Road – the small towns, the people,
the trees and streams, animals in the forests, the mountains and the seasons.
Durmon is the
author of Light
and Shadows in a Nursing Home: Poems and Blind Curves. Her poems have been published in such journals as Rattle, Main Street Rag, Poetry East,
Cyclamens and Blades, Between the Lines, and Lucidity. A former teacher and now
retired mental health counselor, she currently facilitates two support groups.
The poems of Push Mountain Road are the poems of rest
and refreshment, a place to come to and abide as the world’s craziness swirls
around.
No comments:
Post a Comment