Poems and Paintings by PA Artists Barbara Crooker and Claire Giblin

Poet Barbara Crooker

Poet Barbara Crooker collaborated with visual artist Claire Giblin—and 22 others—to produce works for The Handprint Identity Project: An Exchange Between Artists and Poets. Organized by sculptor Milt Friedly, the project was first exhibited in fall 2008 at Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, PA. More about the project here.

Says Crooker: “The work that Claire and I did was "back and forth" ekphrastic work.  She painted "Jade Mountain" after my poem "Climbing the Jade Mountain," and then I wrote "Mountain" based on her painting.

Jade Mountain, acrylic, ink, pigment on paper.
Collection of Roberta McClintock, NY, NY

CLIMBING THE JADE MOUNTAIN

(filling out my son’s SSI forms)

The Chinese poets tell us

that to start an impossible journey

you must begin with small steps,

one foot in front of the other,

on the rock-hard road.  There are

no maps.  The mountain gleams

in the afternoon sun.  The load grows

increasingly heavy.  We

are tired, we are thirsty,

and we want to know

how many dusty miles remain?

The mountain is silent.

All the guidebooks are written

in an ancient language

we don’t understand.

When night overtakes us,

we lie down in a dry

Artist Claire Giblin of Millersville, PA. 
More at http://www.giblinart.com

river bed, with a stone

for a pillow.  Morning

draws her curtains.

We begin again.

MOUNTAIN

After "The Jade Mountain" by Claire Giblin

For Adrianne Marcus

August, and the sun's burners are set on high,

cicadas shrieking at noon. My friend is leaving

this floating life, cancer’s dragon claws deep

in her belly.  The cold mountain lies ahead,

but there are no maps or books to guide her.

We’re all walking the same jade highway.

Barbara Crooker’s poetry collections are Radiance, winner of the Word Press First Book Award and finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize; Line Dance, winner of the Paterson Award for Literary Excellence; More; and Gold.  More at www.barbaracrooker.com.

painters and poets
ekphrastic