Microbursts:An Anthology of the Quabbin Writers Salon (Epi Bodhi, D. Dina Friedman, Marianne Gambaro, Kathryn Holzman, Jane Dephetres Johnson, Eileen P. Kennedy, Maureen Solomon) List Price: $10.00 http:/picaflorpress.weebly.com
Microbursts, an anthology of the Quabbin Writers Salon of Western Massachusetts, is a collection of poetry and prose that explores nature, love and the labyrinths of lives fully lived. This exquisite collection centers around the theme of microbursts—sudden downward bursts of wind from the base of a thunderstorm.
by Steve Pfarrer MICROBURSTS: AN ANTHOLOGY BY THE QUABBIN WRITERS SALON Picaflor Press picaflorpress.weebly.com In October 2014, a bizarre and sudden storm with violent but highly concentrated winds — a microburst — levelled trees and damaged homes along a narrow stretch of Mount Tom and Mountain Road in Easthampton. Members of the Quabbin Writers Salon, a group of local poets and fiction writers, have used that freak storm as the title for a collection of poetry and prose that examines nature in all its beauty, mystery and unpredictability.
The seven writers, from Amherst, Belchertown, Hadley and Monson, have all previously published poetry or other writing — two, D. Dina Friedman and Eileen P. Kennedy, have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize — or have been involved in writing groups. In her short poem “Microbursts,” Jane McPhetres Johnson references the Easthampton storm, seeing it as a reminder of just how fragile our hold on the planet ultimately is, as the wind “uproots tall trees / lifts roofs and trucks / flips the switch / gives a nod and / up the chimney we go. Who? / Who knows!” There are also odes to the changing seasons (“Warm barefoot beach days sing a child’s lullaby”), warnings about the threat of climate change (“where sounds of August frogs diminish, cicadas / sing less and less”) and a serenade to the setting sun (“As surely as the morning’s sun will follow / the oak is last to kiss the sun goodnight”). The collection also includes reflections on love, aging and companionship. As Maureen Solomon writes in “Friends,” friendship can be measured in many ways, like a “sharing of space as if you are / standing below my ladder and holding it so / that I will not fall as I reach fo the stars.” Members of the Quabbin Writers Salon will read from their collection Saturday at 3:30 p.m. at White Square Books in Easthampton.