The Poetry House and the Poem that is Part of It
A West County gift to the world from artist Bruce Johnson and poet Elizabeth Herron
By Bob Jones, Keeping the Faith
Last Tuesday evening, among Bruce Johnson’s massive sculptures in the Museum of Sonoma County in downtown Santa Rosa, a good number of us gathered for Elizabeth Herron’s reading of her poem “The Poet’s House.” She wrote the poem in collaboration with Johnson and the building of the Poetry House, a small, exquisite temple-like structure on the Johnson property about as far west in Sonoma County as one can go.
Twenty-some chairs were arranged around the podium with a large picture of Poetry House behind it. But many more chairs had to be brought in, and there were people standing in the back and some even sitting in Johnson’s sculpture called “Redwood Sofa.”
Johnson is known worldwide for his huge creations in wood and metal, especially redwood and copper. There is hardly any way to describe what he has done. For me, his large pieces are so strong, so full of intricate, if huge, segments, and so clearly fashioned with pulsing energy and care, that I just want to behold and take a deep breath in their presence. His smaller pieces have that same quality of being deeply cared for by the one who crafted them.
Elizabeth Herron, who lives in Graton, has been at the center of Sonoma County poetry for decades. I heard her read several times back in those days when I was getting out more often in the evening. She has won several awards for her work, and, among other titles, has been a recent Sonoma County Poet Laureate. Her poems often call us to deeper awareness of our place in an evolving web of wholeness and blessing.
A small woman with pleasant ways and a warm smile, Herron wore a long black dress with a lavender wrap and a black stole embroidered with flower shapes. She stood at a table on which were three singing bowls, a row of small chimes, and a kind of wand. As she moved from section to section of her poem, various ringing accents came our way, as if to say “breathe now before we go on.”
“The Poet’s House” is a book length poem written in longhand. Four voices speak—The Four Winds, The Buddha, The Coyote, and the Poet. (I think this is right; I was too taken with the moment to jot notes.) The lines for each voice are written in a different color. And many lines of the poem are inscribed in the house itself, in the boards and even in the strands of the light fixture. I expect architecture and poetry may come together this fully in other places in the world, but I don’t know of any.
So a lot happens in this work of art. It includes so much that cannot be summarized or classified. Generations will experience it, ponder it, and be imbued by its presence. Holy impulses and soulful work bring such creations things into being. We can be grateful that Bruce Johnson and Elizabeth Herron, two of our own, conceived of and brought about this gift to the world that rests among us here in western Sonoma County.
Herron’s handwritten book, “The Poet’s House,” is on display in the Sonoma County Museum gallery as part of the “Bruce Johnson: Sculptor” exhibition, which runs through Nov. 30. The Museum of Sonoma County is at 475 Seventh Street in Santa Rosa. Visit Bruce Johnson’s website, Form and Energy, for more information about the artist and more photos of Poetry House.