Kim Baker, Fuller Farm

When she isn’t working at Cotuit Center for the Arts or writing poetry about big hair and Elvis, Kim works to end violence against women and end hunger. A poet, playwright, photographer, and NPR essayist, Kim specializes in ekphrastic poetry, which is poetry inspired by art. She leads a book discussion group called Novel Art, using novels with an art-based theme. Kim previously published and edited Word Soup, an online poetry journal that donated 100% of submission fees to food banks. Kim’s chapbook of poetry, Under the Influence: Musings about Poems and Paintings, is available from Finishing Line Press and from Amazon. Kim's photography has appeared in local and national art exhibits, and she founded the Wickford Art Association’s annual Poetry and Art show. Kim is currently working on a book of ekphrastic poems about the self-portraits of female artists. She is proud to be part of Cape Cod’s Words in the Wild project, a perfect union of poetry and nature founded by Lauren Wolk in collaboration with Barnstable Land Trust.

Let Red Live in Your Heart
By Kim Baker

"... she never had been alive ...  
before she came to live at the farm."  
Sarah Orne Jewett, A White Heron 

Wampanoags teach that a white dove  
bore the sassamanash cranberry  
crimson gift from the Great Spirit 

 fed its farm families red now gone 
today skunk cabbage coyote briar spawn 
white pines climb shimmy murmur 

  sniff the forsythia harken snow falling 
no matter the season let red live  
your heart imagining this still-sacred  
bog-space ever alive for all to embrace 

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Located on the Woodland Trail at the bench by the cranberry bog at Fuller Farm, 995 Rt 149, Barnstable.