This September (2015) marks the 15th anniversary of my Lost in the Woods episode. I went on a solo backpacking trip in the Olympic National Park, tried solo bushwhacking and ended up in need of a rescue. I learned a lot about myself, about the people around me (family and those I had previously considered “close friends”) and people from my various communities. The story has been well-documented here, but I talked to Brett Nunn who has graciously allowed me to reproduce one chapter from his book Panic Rising: True-Life Survivor Tales from the Great Outdoors. It is the most in-depth account of my story and I hope someday to see the place from which I waited for several days for that helicopter that came just after I stopped waiting for it to arrive.
Paul Nelson is founder of SPLAB (Seattle Poetics LAB) in Seattle, the Cascadia Poetry Festival and the August POetry POstcard Fest (PoPo). www.POPO.cards He wrote a collection of essays, Organic Poetry & a serial poem re-enacting the history of Auburn, WA, A Time Before Slaughter (shortlisted for a 2010 Genius Award by The Stranger.) The tenth anniversary edition of that book includes Pig War: & Other Songs of Cascadia. He’s interviewed Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Wanda Coleman, Anne Waldman, Sam Hamill, Robin Blaser, Nate Mackey, Eileen Myles, George Bowering, Diane di Prima, Brenda Hillman, George Stanley, Joanne Kyger & many Cascadia poets (see: https://paulenelson.com/americanprophets/) has presented his poetry and poetics in London, Brussels, Bothell, Cumberland, BC, Qinghai and Beijing, China, Lake Forest, Illinois, Ukiah, CA, and other places & writes an American Sentence every day. www.PaulENelson.com
Wow! What a test of faith and endurance. I’m so pleased, Paul, that you survived this adventure to share your words and enthusiasms with all of us in August Postcard Poetry Fests.
Wow! What a test of faith and endurance. I’m so pleased, Paul, that you survived this adventure to share your words and enthusiasms with all of us in August Postcard Poetry Fests.
Thanks Carol. Hard to believe it has been 15 years. Did you see the links here: https://paulenelson.com/about/lost-in-the-woods-sept-2000/