ECHO AND LIGHTNING is a chapbook and audio CD with cello music. The poems are about winged migration and rapture. On the audio CD, the poems are set in an experimental, free improv cello sound, a song of ascension, composed by Kathy McTavish.

The story is rooted in the body and in the landscape of the north. Sources that inspired this work are the Kalevala (the epic poem of Finland) and Finnish poets, Greek mythology (Leda and the Swan) and the Gnostic book, Thunder, Perfect Mind. The poems examine a woman's intersections with the divine--maybe 'an act of God' is comprised of creation and annihilation in equal parts - and with change. Often, falling in love is like this, both mystical and unsettling. Rapture occurs when we immerse into something new that takes us outside the self. An intense experience is bound to break the ties that bind you to your old life. The deep stories in our history and culture speak of this experience. We don't expect those intersections; we don't expect loss or know how to frame death and rebirth and change.

"Wind turns the body
and ground falls away

geese unafraid of silence
or empty sky
must go must go must go..."

Ellie Schoenfeld, author of THE DARK HONEY, writes:

"And so begins one of the poems in Packa's newest collection. These poems are the story of following one's own instincts to, in one way or another, migrate. They bring us to the exact moment when we surrender to our truest selves, when we allow ourselves to be transported, transformed, and resurrected. In these poems this occurs with the ease and necessity of taking one breath, letting it go and then receiving another. These are ecstatic poems. They are at once ethereal and profoundly grounded in the body. This has always been one of Packa's greatest strengths and every piece in this collection is an awe-inspiring testament to that gift. These poems can help us find our way to the places we most need to go, to where "...music you haven't heard/didn't know you needed/opens deep."

I loved working on this project, and the music that is on the audio CD, in and around the poems, is gorgeous.

thanks!

this project is underwritten by the american composers forum with funds provided by the jerome foundation .

kathy is a fiscal year 2010 recipient of an artist support grant from the arrowhead regional arts council (www.aracouncil.org) which is made possible through an appropriation from the mcknight foundation. the funds from this grant were used to purchase the equipment used to record, mix, and master this work

all wildwood river albums / podcasts

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