Katie Kingston

Humaña,
loving the river the way soldiers
were taught to love:
water for oxen,
tender beans, grass enough
to sleep on,
cottonwoods
whispering all day long
in the language of leaves.

Humaña with his bucket, tin cup,
arranges the river on his plate,
crazy graffiti in the beans
a map of Mexico
stained with pork salt and vinegar.
Desire spills from his sleeves,
and across the bridge of his nose,
the lineage of dust.

—from “Conquest,” a poem by Katie Kingston
(In El Rio de las Animas Perdidas en Purgatorio)

Katie Kingston is the author of three poetry collections: Unwritten Letters, El Rio de las Animas Perdidas en Purgatorio, and In My Dreams Neruda. She is the recipient of the 2010 W.D Snodgrass Award for Poetic Endeavor and Excellence and received an honorable mention as a finalist in the 2010 Nimrod Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry. She has been awarded fellowships from the Colorado Council on the Arts, the Harwood Museum, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation and Fundación Valparaíso, Spain. Her poems can be found in the Atlanta Review, Great River Review, Hawai’i Review, Hunger Mountain, Margie, Nimrod, The Pinch, Runes, and Sugar House Review. Her translations of Mexican poets have appeared in Nimrod International Journal Mexcio/USA and in Mexican Poetry Today, 20/20 Voices.

Kingston is available for seminars on poetry, creative writing, memoir, and translation, as well as for poets-in-the-schools. Her books can be ordered online at mainstreetrag.com or from WECS Press, P.O. Box 383, Fox River Grove, IL 60021-0383. Books can also be purchased at Eagle Totem Gallery in Trinidad, 147 E. Main. kingston@wildblue.net www.katiekingston.com

More than once the eyes of the nation have turned with surprise and fascination on this small city. … Cowboys with their monthly $30 to spend raced horses up and down the streets, firing into the air in true Hollywood style. … Miners burrowed under the pinon-studded hills. And Trinidad—proud, bustling, and ambitious—reaped the wealth. ... Stroll the streets and, with the aid of this book, imagine the history you are seeing.

—A Walk Through the History of Trinidad by Gerald Stokes (Copyright 1986, Trinidad Historical Society. Revised 2000.)

The subtitle of Stokes’s book is “An Irreverent and Frankly Gossipy Guide Through the Corazon de Trinidad National Historic District.” This entertaining tourbook is available at the Carnegie Public Library and the Trinidad History Museum.

On a hot and sticky July morning in 1935, a man walked into The Chronicle-News. ... His brown pants were slightly rumpled and his tie hung limply against the long-sleeved white shirt he was wearing. …

His love of horses was well known. ... His admiration for the animals stayed with him always.

“There will never be a time when the old horse is not superior to any automobile made.”

—“Will Rogers Flew into Trinidad in July, 1935” by Cosette Henritze. (In Trinidad Timelines, vol. 1; copyright 2004 by Cosette Henritze. First printed in the Chronicle-News, Trinidad.)

Cosette Henritze’s Timeline stories on the history of the region have gained such wide readership that the author has begun to collect them into a series of books. Volume 1 is available at the Chronicle-News office and the Trinidad History Museum Bookstore, 312 E. Main.

Richard Louden

Arthur Roy Mitchell ... was king of western pulp magazine cover artists, and a meticulous historian and preservationist, but beyond all this he stood out as a colorful character. … [His] critiquing of [students’] work leaned toward the negative side with only an occasional “not too damn bad,” which was an ultimate in “Mitch-praise,” and enough to send a student’s ego soaring. ... “The artist’s purpose,” [said Mitchell] “is not to reconstruct nature, but to communicate his own emotion and interest to others.”

—Mitchellisms: Anecdotes and Utterances of a Man of Character by Richard Louden (Copyright 2003 by Richard Louden.)

Richard Louden is a local historian and rancher. His lifelong commitment to the community has included service as president of the Colorado Archaeological Society and adviser to state and local education boards. His book is available at the A.R. Mitchell Museum Gallery & Gift Shop, 150 E. Main.

Paula Manini

Because they lived on the Santa Fe Trail, the [Baca] family could purchase seeds and plants from Mexico, Europe, and the United States. ... Most of the herbs and vegetables in the Baca Kitchen Garden reflect the family’s Spanish heritage and the region’s native communities. ... Colorado wild flowers from the plains and foothills are planted in the beds by the pathways.

—A Guide to the Historic Baca-Bloom Gardens by Paula Manini (Published by the Colorado Historical Society.)

Paula Manini is director of the Trinidad History Museum complex on Main Street, which includes the gardens that are the subject of this book as well as three landmark historic buildings. Manini’s book is available in the museum’s bookstore.

Frank LaLumia

Look for relationships instead of things. When you see a tree as its color and value in relation to other colors and values, rather than as a separate and distinct object, then you are thinking like an artist.

—Plein Air Painting in Watercolor & Oil by Frank LaLumia (Copyright 2000 by Frank LaLumia. Used with the kind permission of North Light Books, an imprint of F+W Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.)

Frank LaLumia is a veteran plein air painter. He was educated at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, and the American Academy of Art, Chicago. He is a Signature Member and current president of the Plein Air Painters of America; a Signature Member of the American Watercolor Society, the Oil Painters of America, the National Watercolor Society, and the Transparent Watercolor Society of America; and Artist Member of the California Art Club. He has work in the permanent collection of the Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe; the Albuquerque Museum; and numerous museum, corporate and private collections worldwide. Both his oil and watercolor paintings are shown by fine art dealers nationwide.

LaLumia is the winner of numerous national and regional awards, including Best of Show, Aquarius National Watermedia 2010 Exhibition, Pueblo, CO; Best of Show, San Antonio Museum of Art, Texas Watercolor Society 50th Annual Exhibition; and the Wildlife Award, 2001, Arts for the Parks Annual Exhibition, Jackson, WY.

LaLumia’s work has been featured in Artist Magazine, February 2010; American Artist Magazine, January 2006; Artist Magazine, February 2006, “Making Space for Art”; Plein Air Magazine, Inaugural Issue, 2004; American Artist Magazine, November 2005; Art of the West, March/April 1999; Watercolor Magazine, Summer 2000; Southwest Art Magazine, October 1994; Southwest Art Magazine, June 1989; Best of Watercolor, Rockport Publications, 1995; Splash #6, North Light Publications; How to Make a Painting by Irving Shapiro, Watson Guptil Publications; The Watercolor Answer Book by Catherine Anderson, North Light Publications.
 
Teaching experience includes workshops in oil and watercolor.

LaLumia can be reached by mail at 31855 Old Sopris Rd., Trinidad, CO 81082; by email at Frank@LaLumia.com; by phone at 719-845-1385. Also see LaLumia.com

Jennifer Green

We became friends in spite of the silence. One day I got the OK to call her shinali, as Clifton did; ’Nali for short. It means “my grandma.” She usually just called me ei bilagaana, which means “that white girl.” … Navajos … give traditional names in a naming ceremony for use on special occasions. Otherwise, generic names are quite acceptable. …

These were the circumstances of the friendship between Mrs. Peshlakai and me: practical, unpretentious, and richly inarticulate. A summer went by.

-—“Saying Good-bye to ’Nali” by Jennifer Green (In Woven on the Wind, eds. Hasselstrom et al. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2001. Woven on the Wind is part of an anthology series; see windbooks.com.)

Jennifer Green also publishes in Highlights Magazine. Green lives in a nearby canyon, where she fashioned all 2,400 adobe bricks for her home, as featured in Colorado Home & Garden Lover’s Guide (Fulcrum Publishing, 2003).