The washboard is flicking a quick carrying beat that shakes through you and pulls you to your feet — the accordion is rocking warm, and a low voice coasts over it, laughing …
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Finding waterfalls along the Appalachian Trail
I came to the waterfall almost by accident. I didn’t know I was close — I just wanted to get into the woods on a sunny morning …
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Bright Half Life weaves a love story through time
We’re on a ferris wheel in 1986, and it’s dusk, and two women are sitting close together. They’re holding hands and talking over the bolts rattling in the wind … and they’re in a long and deep relationship.
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Izhar Patkin honors poet Agha Shahid Ali in light (throwback)
On a spring night, Izhar Patkin’s ‘Veil Suite’ fills the long gallery with rooms of translucent paintings, illuminating Agha Shahid Ali’s poetry.
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Revel in a spring hike up Ragged Mountain
On a late March Saturday I climbed Ragged mountain with a co-worker, a friend of his and an ecstatic dog who came back with mud up to his belly.
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Lily Cox-Richard melds land and community
Ceramic fire pots slope against the brick, imprinted with patterns of leaves. Last summer in the Berkshires, people gathered around them on warm nights …
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Mass MoCA shows look toward a new future
Last summer in Southern California, a group of friends made bowls in their back yard, and two days later they hardened them in a wood fire while the clay took on a patina from the smoke …
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What would ee cummings hear out here today?
People are sharing stories in a way I haven’t felt in the Northern Berkshires in a long time — not since Inkberry held writing workshops and readings in a storefront in North Adams …
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Fire and candlelight with red beans and chiles
Wide clay bowls are piled in the corner of the room against the brick wall. I’ve come looking for them in Mass MoCA’s new spring shows — drawn by a local story I heard months ago about their making …
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Quilting thrives with a contemporary energy
From college dorms to quilt shops, an old New England artform is alive in the Berkshires, in patterns and textures from leaves and landscapes to contemporary abstract color.
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