Great Blue, a posthumous collection of poems by Susan Herron Sibbet, spans three decades, from her first published works to her death in 2013. Today at Bird & Beckett, poet Kim Shuck, a San Francisco original and treasure, has invited a bunch of wonderful bay area poets to read and to pay homage to Susan. The program will include:

Linda Noel (former laureate of Ukiah)
Bill Vartnaw (former laureate of Sonoma)
Avotcja (genius)
Jeanne Lupton (grand poet, hosts an event at Frank Bette)
EK Keith (poems under the dome)
A performance of Susan’s poem Rain Suite
Nina Lindsey
Carolyn Miller

Susan Sibbet’s world is large, encompassing both nature’s bounty—great blue herons, two vast blue oceans, the blue globe itself—and the smallest details of domestic life: jam jars, broken china, burnt toast. Her voice is that of a woman fully engaged in what makes us human: the tangled emotions of family, the love of language, the embrace of living, the awareness of death. Great Blue embodies all that is dear to us, from the sorrows of our conflicted lives to the sudden joys of existence.