Bren Simmers

We’ve been living at the Ranger Station for three months now. I am grateful for this time that places creativity and place-based connection at the centre of my life. Each week we go on an outdoor adventure to explore the eastern Fraser Valley. I’ve rode my bike through corn fields taller than me, I’ve canoed along the shore of Harrison Lake, and I’ve sweated up steep coastal hillsides. As the rain turns the fields to shallow ponds, flocks of swans have settled in the valley. Outside my window, I’ve spotted seals (yes, seals) following the salmon run. Buffleheads and herons make their daily appearance.

In late September, Adam and I hosted a house concert in the studio upstairs and felt the warmth of this community. On November 13th, I led my first in a series of writing workshops called It’s All in the Details at the gallery. Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of giving a lecture in Rob Taylor’s poetry class at University of Fraser Valley and reading with Kevin Spenst and Jordan Abel at the UFV Bookstore.

And then there’s the work. I’m delighted to have a new poem in ARC’s Art in End of Times issue that reflects the last few years I spent living in Squamish, BC. This June, along with artist Laurel Terlesky, I will put on a show in the Ranger Station Art Gallery called Narratives of the Lost that features poems and drawings that respond to lost objects from Squamish and use these objects as a jumping off point to talk about about changing community identity. A non-fiction essay about a wilderness canoe trip has surprised me by turning into a hybrid book, and I’m drafting a long poem about my time in Grasslands this summer.

And learning, at a tortoise’s pace, to play the drums.