WRITING CONFERENCE PRESENTERS

DIANNE NELSON OBERHANSLY, DAVE LEE, RAYMOND SHURTZ

What a group we were,
writers and presenters,
At the Hogsback Heritage Project
as hunters gathered on Boulder Mountain
for opening day, turning our back
on hunting for three intensive
"deer days".

Dave Lee, Utah's first Poet Laureate in 1997,
received a Commendation Award in 2002.
In 1999, his collection News From Down too the Cafe
was nominted for a Pulitzer Prize and was a finalist
for Unites States Poet Laureate.
His poem Kaiparowits Pleateau
blankets a wall in GSENM's information center
in Escalante and Wayne County.
He is retired from teaching and came to Boulder
for Cheryl and her mother LaRae.
He wrote poems of crazy women in Texas (or someplace)
on the theme of Women
and made us laugh ...and beautiful poems of
rocks and ledges that made us want to cry.
He taught us metaphor and similie
from his writing and writing
and we were blessed.

Dianne Nelson Oberhansly was born on a
Utah Homestead Ranch ninety miles from the Nevada Test Site.
Her collection of short stories,
A Brief History of Male Nudes in America
won the Flannery Oconnor Award.
What a wizard she is with words.
They weave like a Navaho blanket
throught her presentation.
She makes me want to create words
and more words.

And Raymond, my great Heaven! 30 plays?
I had to read that twice.
I DID NOT KNOW THAT.
Where have I been?
You have gained by teaching;
the tools to find ways for people to
open up and create!
I so enjoyed your presentation.
You seemed both so knowledgeable
and yet more hesitant at the same time.
Appealing somehow.
You know what you know.

I, the writer, was hit with such
a barrage of word and action that
I still can hardly move.
Dave Lee's first class poetry reading
actually did remind me some of
Bohemian Cowboy.
You certainly have to read well
to hold people for an hour and half.
Cheryl, can you hold forth with
even more expansion and depth?
I wouldn't wonder.
You are one to amaze
this old Auntie.
I think you could pull people
out of the hat that the rest
don't believe exists.
And smile and enjoy the moment!