“The upper left edge is the place on the page
where we start writing.”
The Reverend Billy Lloyd Hults
Welcome to America’s upper left edge, the north coast of Oregon. We’ve gathered here to write beyond the far west pavement, crouching under tarps when the rain bears down, clutching to our berry-stained thesauri. This is a fine place for word-freaks to explore our home frontier.
To celebrate your arrival we’ve donned fringy cedar vests and articles made of kelp we found while beachcombing. Want to trade? How about this headband in exchange for some prose or poetry? Go ahead, try it on.
Exploration is fashionable here. Fact is, these sentences were stitched near the grounds of coastal villages that have been around in some form for thousands of years. People claim these rugged headlands act like magnets for venturesome scribes. You’ve probably heard of Lewis and Clark — famed journalists who came here during the off-season, marking property.
Our kind write for other reasons — truth, beauty, and wit. We aspire to honor elders who first spoke here, long ago, weaving words into longhouse stories.
So sit. Enjoy the glow of our driftwood fire. Taste these spicy blooms of self-seeded nasturtiums. At first light we’ll look deep into local tide pools, later commune with ghosts of the old forest. Beatific things live off the beaten track, beyond the fraying ends of conquest.
You look cool in kelp, by the way. We’d be grateful for your comments.