Molly Fisk: First featured author reading at Tangled Roots Open Mic & Reading Series, May 14, 6-7:30 pm

 Molly Fisk, our first featured reader at the Tangled Roots Open Mic & Reading Series on May 14 started at an early age:

April was National Poetry Month and I'm still catching up from a whirlwind of events in Truckee, Grass Valley/Nevada City. More on those highlights soon. The whirlwind is not over! Right here in Truckee this coming weekend May 14 - 17 we have a cluster of free poetry and literary events for all ages, collaborations between Tangled Roots Writing, Trails & Vistas, Truckee Pride, Alibi Ale House - Truckee, Church of the Mountains, and author/poet/radiocaster Molly Fisk. Wow - I dare you to keep up.

I'm not sure where to start with my introduction to Molly Fisk. As our county's first Poet Laureate from 2017-2019, the author of 4 collections of poems and 5 collections of essays, her voice is confident and powerful. Here's her own description: Poet, radio commentator, life coach, writing teacher, painter of barns and mason jars full of water, mentor, speaker, feminist with a capital F, political activist, sister, aunt, cousin, godmother, honorary grandparent, not-very-old elder, swimmer, former banker, one-time sweater designer, long-walk taker, rearranger of furniture, color maven, nature lover. 

You can listen to her radio essays on KVMR’s News Hour, Friday at 8:06 a.m. Pacific, 89.5 on your FM dial, streaming at kvmr.org 

I founded the open mic and reading series at Alibi in Truckee last November. My vision always involved the opportunity to invite local, regional, and nationally-recognized poets and writers as featured readers to open the event. The open mic serves as a gathering place for literary community, poetry-curious locals, and adventurous serendipitous visitors dining and drinking at Alibi. So far, poets and writers and singer-songwriters of all ages and levels of experience have supported each other, cheered on their peers, and stepped onstage to perform. An open mic provides the nurturing ground for developing and discovering voices, ideas, passions, and desires. 

I'm so excited for Molly Fisk to be our first featured reader at the event! She'll be sharing new work from her most recent book published this past April, titled Walking Wheel.  

I've pulled some blurbs from Molly's website:

"Walking Wheel is a tender, lyrical portrait of pioneer love and labor that revives the quiet heroism of everyday life in 1875, where intimacy, resilience, and devotion shape the story of home.

In this rich new collection, Molly Fisk braids together the ordinary tasks of love and work in 1875, a century we’ve almost forgotten but whose human concerns are universal and timeless."

The form is experimental in a way, as the book is historical fiction, a novel-in-verse. And each page used the techniques of verse, with line breaks and shaping on the page, integrated into her rich storytelling. The two main characters are newlyweds Phoebe and Miles Imlay. The journey moves from "their birthplace in central Oregon to California’s Surprise Valley. These are quiet, lyrical poems building a private world of intimacy and effort in alternating voices. From sawing timber, turning the heel of a sock, and measuring a pie’s baking with verses of a song, through sex, pregnancy, and childbirth, the couple’s first year of marriage working side by side is offered to us in resonant, unexpected detail."

Bring your own poems and prose and songs to share on stage this Thursday. Or join the most important people in the room, you! the audience, and cheer on our artsy community!