Poet & Writer
Recent Poetry Projects

the tossing dream
Published by Finishing Line Press, May 2023

Section from 'The Garden' in the tossing dream.
I fall deeply
another room,
hollow filled
with past dreams.
How soft, how sweet
Georgia O’Keefe knew how to paint
a skeleton
white against blue
body’s poetry of death
waiting,
disintegrating,
etched.

On The Tossing Dream, by Jade Rosina McCutcheon
Short lines, syncopated rhythms. These unrhymed, unmetered lyric poems give pleasure akin to that of rhymed, metrical verse. And they are full of intense color, reminiscent of Fauvist and Expressionist canvases. They create an experience of synesthesia: sounds have color, color and light have sound. They reflect a deep sense of connection to non-human fellow creatures and to the earth we share with them. And they find light in the least likely places. Indeed, though some of the subjects are dark—a mother’s last days, difficulties of a brother far away, wildfire and other (un-)natural disasters, pandemic and related societal ills, mental malaise—the overall tone is light. When a screaming bark wakes the poet in the small hours, she joshes the culprit, a red fox, “Did you sign up / for that piercing scream / or was it just / the luck of the draw?” Addressing her brother, “earth weary old man / silver bright mind / on old giraffe knees,” the poet urges him, “Be light / upon yourself / be light / unto yourself.”
Eleanor Berry
A former teacher of writing and literature at Willamette University, Marquette University, the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, she is 2014-2016 President of the National Federation of State Poetry Societies and a past president of the Oregon Poetry Association. Her poetry has appeared widely in journals and anthologies. Author of Works of Wildfire and three earlier poetry collections.
October 8, 2022

the tossing dream
May 2023
Jade Rosina McCutcheon reads from her new chapbook, SMALL FEATHER and discusses her work in poetry, theater arts, and the intersections of performance and literary arts.
Radio interview with Steve Slemenda
https://kmuz.org/episode/jade-rosina-mccutcheon/

UPROOTING: Surviving Domestic Violence
Will be published by The Poetry Box, Portland in September 2023. Copies will be available through most online bookstores.
A collection of poetry, art and writings by survivors of domestic and sexual abuse with some clear steps about surviving such ordeals.