The Penland-Inspired Poetry of Pierce Freelon







	Penland Stories The Penland-Inspired Poetry of Pierce Freelon Pierce Freelon, musician, educator, poet, and activist, performed a specially-commissioned series of spoken-word pieces at the 26th annual benefit auction on August 13, 2011. In preparation, he spent a few days at Penland in June, exploring the studios, meeting students and staff, and taking in the mission and atmosphere of the place. He did quite a bit of writing as well, completing several of the poems during that stay. The performance itself was a great success, earning a standing ovation and opening the Saturday live auction with a spirit of generosity and excitement. Click here to read an interview with Pierce in June on the Penland Sketchbook Blog Click here to visit Pierce's website The Conductor inspired by the upper and lower metals studios and the iron studio click bang klank click click bang klank click bang klank click click bang klank music to my ears welding melodies with methodical precision these musicians wield metallic instruments sculpting copper and silver like a classical composer students write steel symphonies and metal is the conductor slamming hammers into anvils like xylophones creating notes and tones that send chills through my bones I feel like I'm in a jazz club during the Harlem Renaissance artists are all around me improvising, collaborating and synthesizing connected like the links in a chain breathing life into brass like Coltrane but instead of blowing saxophones they hammer notes out of cold stones older than pterodactyl bones creating jewels of various hues I've watched them bend wires like guitar strings singing The Blues with a pick and metal pliers I'm inspired by the love it seems blacksmiths have just a little more iron in their blood whether you design rings that look like they were meant for Mayan kings or melt metal into golden streams as architectural structures emerge from your dreams I love to listen when your hammer sings click bang klank click click bang klank Click here to watch Pierce rehearsing "The Conductor" at Penland in June how does one grow glass flowers?* how does one grow glass flowers? it starts with an idea when a seed is planted within you and grows like a weed waiting to blossom in the sunlight glass flowers are born of the same soil that produces all flora you nourish the sand with a blow torch much like the suns rays and watch while heat waves transform energy like photosynthesis blowing glass like trumpets for royal empresses two lips breathe life into crystal tulips and the seeds of inspiration reach fruition dragons are not fantasy they live and breathe fire in glass studios with lungs full of hot coals these young artisans blow I've watched flowers glow like a molten hot rose and though I petal prose and spit piping hot lyrics and blistering flows I still stand in awe of the beauty enclosed in a glass flower Click here to watch Pierce performing "how does one grow glass flowers" at the annual benefit auction African Seamstress inspired by Penland’s upper and lower textiles studios and my grandmother, the late Queen Mother Frances Pierce I'm comfortable in my own skin because my grandmother was an African seamstress she stretched cinnamon fabrics over my bamboo bones wrapped me in bronze flesh hemmed in crimson stitched the finest traditions into my linens I wear her heritage with border line arrogance wrapped in ceremonial African melanin I'd stand as silent as a mannequin starring as my grandmothers hands plucked the strings of her loom like a mandolin her womb must have been full of beautiful fabrics because my mother resembles a quilt hair of wool stitched into black silken skin with a cotton white smile Queen Mother was a master of textiles four brown grand-babies busting at the seams she bundled us in her kente cloth and carried us around with her wherever she went threading us through flea markets and festivals and venues she would then use those experiences to deepen our hues saturate us in madder so we could know our roots and emerge from our burgundy baptism ready to tailor our dreams and adorn the world like an African seamstress Click here to watch Pierce performing "African Seamstress" at the annual benefit auction watch the thrown inspired by the upper and lower clay studios at Penland School of Crafts for thousands of years human beings have thrown things ancient Greek Olympians threw javelin and discus we throw coins into fountains frisbees and fishing lines I teach at UNC where students throw parties and people drink until they throw up while watching athletes throw footballs but here at Penland when I first walked into upper clay I felt as if I were in a middle school cafeteria students sat at their desks fists full of what looked like mashed potatoes ready to throw with reckless abandon I felt the overwhelming urge to duck one man sitting on a clay caked stool told me that when his wife gets really mad at him she throws things all different types of things she throws plates she throws cups bowls and vases whatever she can get her hands on but this is not domestic violence, see this is domestic vibrancy my friend Bobby Kadis told me he likes to throw things too he throws sculptures and pots and mugs until his fingernails are stuffed with clay like God's fingernails must have been when she first sculpted her son Adam from the dust in throwing classes two hands and an open mind can transform the Earth literally transforming the earth beneath our feet by rotating it 360 degrees on a wheel much like the Earth's axis - what power the Blue Ridge Mountains remind me of Mount Olympus I've watched apprentices of Zeus burrow through boulders and throw from their thrones they eat dinner off tectonic plates carving fault lines into the Earth's crust they serve us a slice of life fresh from the furnace glazed and burnished one man told me he quit his job as a banker exchanged earning pay and owning stocks so he could mold clay and throw pots his latest piece is a gravestone he sealed his past life in a ceramic sarcophagus and ascended from the kiln like a clay phoenix ready to exhume his soul from its tomb free from his porcelain prison he scaled the Appalachians to study under a sage emperor and learn how to produce China like a terra cotta warrior he dug into the experience and now shapes and molds his own destiny years later he appreciates the ability to throw having thrown himself into the experience at Penland Click here to watch Pierce performing "watch the thrown" at the annual benefit auction