On Burton Hill, screened from the road by a copse of fir trees, a strawberry picker’s shack dressed in pink paint stands on a knoll in an open pasture. Bookshelves line the interior that houses two tables stacked with reams of green and blue rice paper, colored photographs, rulers, bone folders and signets of poetry ready to be sewn and glued into cloth covers. Writer Mary G.L. Shackelford is crafting, by hand, the third chapbook in her poetry series. The author will read and sign her new book, “Song in my Belly,” at 6 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12, at the Vashon Bookshop.
Shackelford has lived on Vashon for the last 28 years, but in many ways she is just now coming home. She and her husband Jim Burke left the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia in 1978 and drove across the country to settle, sight unseen, on Vashon. The writer, mother, backporch musician and longtime organizer and supporter of island arts has worn many hats since then.
In the early 80s, Shackelford wrote for The Beachcomber, helping editor Jay Becker establish an arts page. For 15 years, she worked tirelessly at Vashon Allied Arts filling many roles, including performing arts and literary arts coordinator, president of the board and executive director before moving on to a job writing a newsletter for a school in Seattle. In 2009, with the influx of technology, Shackleford said she worked her way out of that job and returned to her home and pink studio on Burton Hill.
“It was a hard time,” she said. “It was a blow, so this book is a collection of work about coming home to the song in my belly. I’ve always marched to my own tune, but this has been (an opportunity) to explore and be joyful about being home versus being out in the world.”
The writer said that a large part of her sojourn over the past six years involved playing music — learning the mandolin from island musician Paul Colwell — hence the musical references of the book’s chapter titles. She also credits her practice of contemplative dance, taught by islander Joan Hanna, with the genesis of the new poems.
In the title poem, the last stanza of “Song in My Belly” alludes to the contemplative dance practice: “In the unfolding of /Their shapes /A moving still life/A living prayer/ A meditation /Of fearless dancing/Like the song/In my belly.”
“I have always written,” Shackelford said, “but many of these poems came after dancing in Joan’s barn. The practice concludes with creative writing, drawing or meditative sitting. I would read what I had written to the other women. When you hear a poem out loud, then you can tell if it has something to say. A lot of the poems started there, and then I worked on them. They went through many iterations.”
Shackelford finished the poems in 2014, hoping to publish that same year, but the handcrafted nature of the way she likes to create her books took longer than expected. Indeed, the process is labor intensive, though clearly beloved by Shackelford.
With an 1899 letter press from Alaska — which she and a group of islanders in the 1980s used to hand set and publish books under Laughing Dog Press — Shackelford set the title by linotype and hand-printed each of the 150 covers. Then using large sheets of paper, she tore the covers and end pages and marked the fold lines with a bone folder.
Gathered around her tables like women at an old fashion sewing bee, Shackelford’s daughter Margot Burke and islanders Shirley Ferris, Rayna Holtz and Robin Gage tore, folded, sewed and bound the books, sharing what Shackelford described in the book’s acknowledgement as “intimacy, laughter, willingness and diligence.”
Naming other helpers at the end of her book, Shackelford gives a grateful nod to islanders Ann Spiers, Candy Gamble, Joan Hanna, Margaret Smith and her sister Preston Shackelford, who lives back in Virginia.
As for what will follow “Song in My Belly,” Shackelford said she and Ferris have been gathering stories from island residents about what it means to live on Vashon. The duo plan to produce a literary performance called “The Heart of Vashon” in January and then archive the material for the heritage museum. After that, she’s not sure, though she knows it will involve writing.
“I might do some prose … maybe music and a little travel,” Shackelford said. “Jim retired in June and (it feels) like we are finally harvesting our dreams. We don’t need to light up the world. We are here, and I’m a lucky person … coming home to the song in my belly.”
