Petaluma poet featured in new anthology, to be read in Occidental

Phyllis Meshulam’s two-year term as poet laureate of Sonoma County ended in March. But her contributions to the area’s literary scene have not.

Meshulam is a teacher and tireless proponent of her medium — she has worked with young writers in such programs as CalPoets, Poetry Out Loud, and the Petaluma Poetry Walk — who has published four volumes of her own poems.

Now Meshulam has edited an anthology of verse composed, with a few notable exceptions, by area poets — some of whom will read their work at an upcoming event in Occidental.

“The Freedom of New Beginnings, Poems of Witness and Vision from Sonoma County,” edited by Meshulam with Gail King, Gwynn O’Gara, and Petaluma’s Terry Ehret, was released earlier this year.

A selection of poets featured in that collection will read from their work from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Sunday at the Occidental Center for the Arts. The readings will be followed by a Q&A, book sales and signing.

Copperfield’s Books in Santa Rosa had three copies in stock Wednesday morning, while the Copperfield’s in Sebastopol ordered several copies that will be delivered later in the week.

As Meshulam states in the book’s preface, “our world today faces many challenges.”

For this anthology, she invited poets to address those challenges. Seventy-two, including Meshulam, contributed work. Most are local, but at least two — former U.S. poet laureates Juan Felipe Herrera and Joy Harjo — are not.

While Meshulam had intended to conduct numerous in-person workshops during her tenure as poet laureate, the COVID-19 pandemic thwarted those plans. Instead, the workshops took place online.

Still, she writes in the preface, contributors “rallied” and submitted a large number of “excellent” poems for the anthology.

For guidance on organizing them, Meshulam referred to a book by environmental activist and author Joanna Macy. That volume, “The Work That Reconnects,” begins with the topic of gratitude, moves to “honoring our pain for the world,” then “seeing with new eyes,” Meshulam explained.

Those became “the three themes of this anthology.”

While each of the anthology’s poems is very strong, she found herself especially taken by Katherine B. Kraus’ “The Crushing Green,” whose angry, urgent verses include:

“My heart is fury

at wanton greed

who strips the Goddess with its need.”

Meshulam was likewise moved by William Greenwood’s “Shot from Guns.” Prefaced by the italicized text of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, it goes on to catalog the carnage caused by firearms in this country, then asks:

“How could this come to be? Money

into the pockets of congressional puppets?

What witless or heartless judge hallows

a private right to keep and bear arsenals?”

The collection includes the poem “I Won’t Be Silence,” by Dezeree Prater, a student at Maria Carrillo High School in Santa Rosa. Its litany of laments includes:

“I woke up this morning and turned on the news to see that

My brothers and sisters are still being killed” and;

“I woke up this morning crying my sad tears with the

Families of all those who died because of the hate that

People have for my skin” and;

“I woke up this morning trying to shave

My hair because it did not fit in with society’s beauty standards.”

The poem ends, nonetheless, on a defiantly hopeful note.

The anthology takes its name from the final poem of the collection. In “Heron, Like Smoke,” Sonoma County poet laureate emerita Katherine Hastings, who moved to upstate New York following the wildfires of 2017, writes of that bird:

“Your euphoric flight

is charged by new daylight

propels us into memory beyond fire

beyond the slog of escape

beyond the catastrophe of ash

throbbing in the glass

of abandoned dreams

Light follows you, cuts a path

equal to the loss of the abandoned nest

equal to the freedom new beginnings bring.”

The book’s cover features a majestic blue heron in flight. That arresting picture was taken by Phyllis Meshulam’s husband, Jerry.

“He just happens to be a bird photographer,” she said.