I have had my refurbishing. The world we are living in is changing rapidly. I don't have much more to say. I guess at the end of it, some will cultivate their gardens. I will sweep the floor.
What a diaphanous and yet keenly visceral work of art you've created with the felt clarity of these lyrics! Between sadness and desire, this poetic sequence makes wholeness of fragmentation. Such a strong juxtaposition: the fragments of an ancient poet - and the deconstruction of a life in the present. You put the trauma of today in mythic perspective. With The Sound of Loneliness, you listen for life's meaning. Truth answers in sorrow - beauty with wonder.
A.A. Attanasio, award winning novelist
SOUND OF LONELINESS
THE SOUND OF LONELINESS Poem Fragments
INTRODUCTION
I chose to spend a winter writing on an isolated beach in Maine. My only diversions were the visits to my mother in an independent living facility and a meeting with my elderly aunt. My residency was to be alone time in the family beach house but I was frequently visited by the ghosts of childhood past. I had no idea what might come through my self-imposed solitude. This little book is a testament to sounds lapping the shore of my loneliness.
DEDICATION
THE SOUND OF LONELINESS Poem Fragments
For
The androgynous poet Sappho, whose legend for me became real the winter of 2012 AD
It is september, 2001 in the French countryside. The blind herdsman Josef has just passed away. From his strange landing place, he peers down to the Pyrenean valley below. We meet the friends and neighbors he has left behind, including the foreigner Helene. Through visions and dreams Josef begins to communicate with Helene. They hold the ancient information that will eventually help them remember where they came from, who they are, and how they can return home. Their story takes us to the same valley 2000 years ago, to prehistoric Ireland and from France in the 1930’s to present day. Marianne Press, 350 pages. 2007
Response: PEASANTS AND POETS
Pamela Preston’s haunting passages and ancient heartbeat rhythms tune our sensitivities to subtle mythical themes, locating those hidden spaces in the world and in our hearts to which we have lost the way. The intense authenticity of this poet’s noel requires the suspension of an ordinary sense of reality, a giving over to the music of remembering. It nourishes our ability to live in the world of today, while sensitive to the earths movements and the movements of time. Ms Preston has had the courage to paint her own artistic vision, and we are the beneficiaries. Ann Yeomans, Archetypal Therapist
“I think this is beautifully written. I like the way you reach into the characters’ heads and hearts and there is a strong sense of portent throughout these pages. I am extremely impressed with what you’ve accomplished. Congratulations. You’ve written a meaningful novel.” Lou Aronica, former publisher of Berkley Books
"I declare that Peasants and Poets magically fuses bucolic history and futuristic presence, so that through the narrative force of your story the reader slips away on four dimensions. Added to up-down, left-right, forward backward, topologists define the orthogonal direction of a fourth spatial dimension as spassitude-spissitude, or upsilon-delta. You move us with deft spassitude into the aboriginal and then with lyric spissitude we're coping with avian flu! It's an outstanding work of art. The more I live with it, the better I appreciate your artistry and the weight of history and problematical humanity you had to shoulder to carry this off. Brava!” AA Attanasio, celebrated science-fiction novelist
This epic poem is a personal odyssey framed by the poet's life in the French Pyrenees, New England, and Ireland - spanning ten years. It is an exploration of a feminine soul's transformation across time. Alternating between free verse and couplet rhyme, this intimate story will stimulate the inner journeys of both men and women - singing through the recesses of human struggle to the birth of new meaning for the individual and, therefore, the world. Marianne Press, 100 pages. 2002
RESPONSE: LA CHANSON
I am profoundly moved by your book. You have dropped into your very depths and allowed its rhythms to dance on the pages. Your images are vital, transforming, into the body from the body. Marion Woodman , Author of CONSCIOUS FEMININITY
Pamela Preston is a gifted and visionary writer, able to find poetic language for the depths of the feminine soul. The Chanson is a marriage of myth and art, an epic journey of transformation, full of beauty, wisdom and grace." Camille Maurine, Author of MEDITATION SECRETS FOR WOMEN
Truth is so much stranger than fiction. That it may be told at all is the sublime act of the poet, all too rare and in dire need of readers as bold. This is such a book. Pursue it as would your own truth, with great regard. Peter Bradburn, Author of "Mercurius" and "Imago."