Rootdrinker Institute

News

       ROOTDRINKER
                 P.O. Box 522
           Delmar, N.Y. 12054

ROOTDRINKER PRESENTS

A POETRY READING

& POETRY OPEN MIKE
Weds. Oct. 1st, 2008 at The Perfect Blend Coffeehouse
376 Delaware Ave., Delmar, NY

Coffee & Open Mike Sign-up at 7:00 pm

Reading Starts at 7:30 pm

Featured Poet: Michael Czarnecki
FootHills Publishing of Kanona, NY
Never Stop Asking For Poems– Selected Works

ROOTDRINKER INSTITUTE STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

Rootdrinker Institute encourages artists, musicians, writers, and crafters to use local images, lore, and legends. Rootdrinker promotes rediscovery of the inspirations and creative visions of earlier artists and writers of each unique watershed. Rootdrinker advocates increased interest in nature, local history, and local traditions. Rootdrinker continues to publish small press books that reflect these purposes.

At the center of Rootdrinker Institute’s philosophy is the vision of people defining the territory they call their own in terms of their local watershed. This focus allows the natural rather than the political to inform their education. Such an orientation stimulates a sense of place, and the growth of a unique area cultural life. To promote this viewpoint, and to further its encouragement of the artistic community, Rootdrinker Institute sponsors publications, readings, concerts, conferences, seminars, and social gatherings.

On hiking trails, along streams, in libraries, through prose and poetry, the goal of preserving and improving the land and keeping alive the heritage of its people by joining with friends and neighbors is inherent to all of Rootdrinker Institute’s work

His head became the mountains
His breath the wind and clouds
His voice the thunder
His limbs the four quarters of the earth
His blood the rivers
His flesh the soil
His beard the constellations
His skin and hair the plants and trees
His teeth, bones and marrow the metals, rocks, and precious stones
His sweat the rain
The insects creeping over his body the human beings

---- from story of P'an Ku, fashioner of the universe Chinese Taoist origin

The others spoke to theologians and magicians, and he speaks to poets and artists.The others drew their symbols from theology and alchemy, and he from the flowers of spring and the leaves of summer; but the message is the same, and the truth uttered is the truth God spake to the red clay at the beginning of the world.
... W.B. Yeats in Introduction to Collected Poems of William Blake