Vermont Sharp

Every American state is beautiful, but only a few are iconic, and Vermont must be reckoned first among these. As with any experience, the unique flavors and moods of the Green Mountain State are savored most sharply by an outsider, someone who - in true Swamp Yankee fashion - abandoned the pressures of a certain southerly New England state for the lush woods of Vermont's Northeast Kingdom. With a title derived from their fairytale-kingdom beauty, the state's three northeastern counties - Caledonia, Orleans, and Essex - trail fabled histories in song and story, a shared heritage of unforgiving harshness paired with unspoiled rural charm. In this collection of poems, inspiration is encountered, interpreted, and painted, sometimes directly from life, other times as embellished by folk-memory and a far past gilded by the passage of time.