Kristina Stykos

Far from the madding crowd, but keenly aware of the dangerous & uncertain world we live in, Kristina Stykos’ poems from rural Vermont uncover “a joy shining through cracked prisms of love, loss and letting go”, exploring from the ground up, what it is to be human. Working as a landscape gardener, while trying to eke out a living as a musician, Stykos’ persistent voice is as singular as it is unsentimental, musing on a hardscrabble existence made transcendent by the nearly indescribable beauty of her wild and remote surroundings. Using language that is conversational and easy to grasp, her poems are at once elegant and dynamic, taking us directly into the heart her daily routines. Whether it’s pruning a gangly rose bush, eating lunch on a truck tailgate, or taking a chance on a muddy & forgotten dirt road, she makes it clear that there is always more to understand and contemplate about this gnarly paradox we call life. “Through Kristina Stykos’ unflinching lens, we harbor fleeting essences of what it means to live indivisibly from the land—its woods, fields, farms, gardens, streams, mountains, backroads, and everything that grows and fades only to grow again—among neighbors, strangers, friends…all who are inescapably at home in it … Savor the art of a true Vermont original whose deeply inhabited renderings encourage us to linger here, as long and often as we like. “ Partridge Boswell

Far from the madding crowd, but keenly aware of the dangerous & uncertain world we live in, Kristina Stykos’ poems from rural Vermont uncover “a joy shining through cracked prisms of love, loss and letting go”, exploring from the ground up, what it is to be human. Working as a landscape gardener, while trying to eke out a living as a musician, Stykos’ persistent voice is as singular as it is unsentimental, musing on a hardscrabble existence made transcendent by the nearly indescribable beauty of her wild and remote surroundings. Using language that is conversational and easy to grasp, her poems are at once elegant and dynamic, taking us directly into the heart her daily routines. Whether it’s pruning a gangly rose bush, eating lunch on a truck tailgate, or taking a chance on a muddy & forgotten dirt road, she makes it clear that there is always more to understand and contemplate about this gnarly paradox we call life. In this sumptuous, illustrated edition, the author’s own full-color landscape photos have been matched with poems. Working and traveling through lesser known parts of Vermont with a Lumix G2 digital camera always at the ready, her images are intimate and stunning. They carry the mark of a native woods rambler, as well as that of a keen observer of flowers, painting honest portraits of nature’s inner sanctum, caught in precious, fleeting moments of changing light, throughout the seasons. “Through Kristina Stykos’ unflinching lens, we harbor fleeting essences of what it means to live indivisibly from the land—its woods, fields, farms, gardens, streams, mountains, backroads, and everything that grows and fades only to grow again—among neighbors, strangers, friends…all who are inescapably at home in it … Savor the art of a true Vermont original whose deeply inhabited renderings encourage us to linger here, as long and often as we like. “ Partridge Boswell