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In her first book of poems, Divided Eye, Katharine Carle presents us with work that is vigorous, adventurous, and beautifully crafted. Replete with wit, deep emotion, honesty, and generosity of spirit, Carle’s poems are in part a love letter to a mother from whom she sometimes felt divided and in part the record of a life lived courageously and lovingly. Always her work demonstrates that a divided personality is not a fault but the natural condition of anyone who lives life to the hilt. No less a poet than Sue Ellen Thompson has written as follows: “In Divided Eye you will find a woman in whose poems the experiences of an entire lifetime—from her tomboy childhood to her maturity as a wife, a mother, and a writer—come together to form a luminous whole. The first thing you may notice is Katharine Carle’s gift for imagery: she describes the portrait of an ancestor as having ‘a mouth set thin as if slit by a razor.’ But such gems are only part of what glitters here. Shining even more brightly is her open-eyed, open-hearted wonder at the world into which she was born—a world where it seems there is nothing that is not worth trying to capture in a poem. But while other poets ‘pale,’ to use the language of ‘Antarctica,’ at the enormity of their task, Carle ‘revel[s] in the gale.’ Prepare to be, as I was, blown away.”
Born in the vortex of the Great Depression, Katharine Carle describes her early life in North Haven, Connecticut as fairly typical of a young woman’s in the ’40s and ’50s. Early on, however, she showed signs of heterodox behavior. She married early while a freshman at Wellesley College and had two sons, working in cardiac research while her husband was in medical school. In her second marriage to a man she describes as “the good husband,” she inherited two daughters to go with the sons of her first marriage. As owners of travel agencies with a focus on educational journeys for museums and schools, she and her husband traveled much of the world. Excepting India and Tibet, there are few countries she has not visited. A Christian and a Buddhist, she tries to practice the Zen proverb that urges us to “chop wood and carry water” as a way to achieve enlightenment. She believes that it is in the process of washing the dishes, writing the book, and saying goodbyes to loved ones who have taken their leap off this planet that enlightenment occurs. Katharine Carle’s work has appeared in a number of literary journals and in the 2001 anthology produced at The Frost Place, where she was an invited participant in the Robert Frost Festival of Poetry. She conducts a poetry group at the Seabury Retirement Community, where she also plans literary events and is regarded as a danger to public safety, having organized a Solstice ceremony, complete with a sky-scraping bonfire and unseemly behavior. She threatens to do more of the same. Click here to read sample poems from Divided Eye. Click here to see/hear a full feading on SCTV. Click here to see and hear the author reading "Bodies" and here to see/hear the author reading "Damned Doves." Click here to see and hear the author reading "Bill" and here to see and hear the author reading "Luxury." Click here to view upcoming events
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BOOK STATISTICS ISBN 978-1-936482-01-6
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