ALONE ON A WINDY RIDGE: The skies just east of here

Sunday, August 24, 2008

The skies just east of here

...have been busy today. I could see the bird dog from my office window. We finally took a drive at 4:30 to see what was going on. We walked up a quad trail and then climbed a hill to get this pic.

The helicopter wasted no time. It was quite a sight. When we turned to leave we saw people in the rocks all around.

*
August 25

Word has it the fire was close to the ski chalet. The cross country ski trails are excellent up here, or so I'm told. I'm not a skier. I've only hiked on them in the summer and only once or twice in the twenty-some years I've lived up here. One time I sat on a hill just off a trail and painted. A watercolour. I remember it was going really well. Then I overworked part of it. Not good. Anyway, had we gone earlier yesterday I would've got pics of the waterbombers as they knocked down the fire. I love those planes. The deep rumble. But I'm happy we went when we did, as I've seen waterbombers at work before, but never a helicopter. I liked its nimbleness. Its funky bucket.

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"This is a skilled poet having good fun, and inviting us all to join the party." - Shelley A. Leedahl, SaskBooks Reviews. Read more.

"Employing a variety of forms and the culvert stories — who knew? — of numerous people, she digs beneath the obvious roads to find out what keeps the water — the subconscious, the unconscious — flowing smoothly, discovering a variety of things about herself, notably the everyday masks we wear and the aging process we won’t always admit to." - Bill Robertson, The Star Phoenix. Read more.

"For Schmidt is indeed a poet. Readers can expect to encounter many visual and acoustic delights along the way, from internal rhymes to arresting images." - Trevor Cook, The Antigonish Review #196.

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"You can just feel the stones rattling off your undercarriage on this Grid." - Bill Robertson, The Star Phoenix. Read more.

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"In Grid, moments are approached in their apparent stability only to be swept away in song rife with interruption and fresh stimuli, lending a new perspective. It is as though the familiar ground is an eye glancing back and the reflection only a nodal-point, open to opportunity and play." - Justin Dittrick, SPG Book Reviews. Read more.

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"These supple, witty, and incisive poems delineate our relationship to grids and systems both visible and invisible, natural and political." - Judges' citation, Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry nomination. Jurors: Shawna Lemay, Barbara Nickel, Sharon Thesen.