Aaron Abeyta Named New Western Slope Poet Laureate

Aaron Abeyta reading at the Karen Chamberlain Poetry Festival, 2012

Colorado, Denver, the Pike’s Peak Region, San Miguel County – many regions and jurisdictions have begun honoring poets by naming them to the honorary position of poet laureate. San Miguel County has Elle Metrick of Norwood as its laureate, the Pike’s Peak Region has Price Strobridge, Chris Ransick’s term as Denver’s laureate ended in 2010 but funding cuts have precluded the naming of another so far, and Colorado College poet/prof Dave Mason is the state’s much-esteemed laureate.

Elle Metrick

Western Colorado has always been a long ways from the urban centers of the Front Range, and has sometimes been overlooked in the field of arts. But poetry has been a vibrant and powerful practice on the Western Slope – hosting a number of poetry festivals over the years: Talking Gourds in Telluride, Sparrows in Salida, the Festival of the Imagination in Del Norte, and now the Karen Chamberlain Poetry Festival in Carbondale.

Chris Ransick

By way of celebrating that fact, the festival named a Western Slope Poet Laureate two years ago. In a stealth move that caught me by surprise, I was honored with that title. And now, the laurels pass over to a new Western Slope Poet Laureate – Aaron Abeyta. Award-winning poet and professor at Adams State College in Alamosa, Aaron’s family hails from many generations in the San Luis Valley’s Antonito community.

Dave Mason

Here's a letter poem for Aaron that I read at the festival when we made the laureate announcement.

a letter to Aaron

as the sun rises en nuestros corazones

hermano

let us begin with a prayer

because everything we invite into our lives

sits at the table of the sacred

in nomine madre tierra

et padre cielo

et spiritus pueblo

here at Cloud Acre

on the cusp of the San Juan Mountains

and the Colorado Plateau

the grass still sleeps in its gray and gold

though change is in the air

the wild punishing winds

that test our allegiance to spring

gusts that sweep the mesa clean

like a mad dowser searching for water

the flowering we can’t see yet

but that we wind-blown ones

believe will come

and humbly share as a ray of hope

this is the time of year

when our eyes search for anything green

some sign of life born of water

and sun

that golden orb of all our inspirations

reflected in the light that pours

from our body’s solar plexus

to protect us from the harm

that spins its devils in the dust

and to warm the world

into yielding us its cornucopia of gifts

the mantle of this award comes

from just such a gifting

the promise of Colcha you wove

into our minds as a cape of many colors

a path of many ways

a multi-ethnic design flourishing

out of the fabric of many craftings

Aaron, I have seen a horse’s eye

the galaxies and nebulae

in that deepest brown

that is skin and mud and the land

that we love

married as we are to earth

to each other

to this place called Colorado

its ancient reds its skies beyond blue

and the invading whites of winter

your voice is la primavera

four syllables that inspire us

to bud

to bring our best green into being

yours are the seeds our love is made of

in the sunlight of your lyric valuables

in the poems you fashion for us

like a child’s mud cakes

on the banks of the San Miguel

we grow playful

and are inspired to work

at what is most important

the messy pigments of truth-telling

those lessons nature affords us

the real opportunity to learn

and so we share this honor with you

amigo

that you may go on inspiring

the many adams and eves

longing for los colores en sus ojos

the fire in your belly

and this green we set above your brow

is meant not so much as crown

but as beacon

un rayo de esperanza