I cranked the hollow cylinder of the printing press and a bunch of neatly-emptied sunflower seed hulls and a half-gnawed hickory nut fell out. Print shop life! It's a rural community, and most of my neighbors are other-than-human — including the occasional mouse. #letterpress #printshop #rurallife

“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep.” — Henry David Thoreau, *Walden* Photo: Morning moon-set over the mountain here. #thoreau #mountains #blueridgemountains

Have a peace-full day, friends.

I missed being in the print shop today, but at least managed to write three poems and replace the tractor’s busted radiator hose. #gratitude #rurallife #nelsoncounty #poetry #poetryisnotaluxury #poemsandtractors #johndeere #shadetreemechanic

“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” — Henry David Thoreau, *Walden* (1854) #thoreau #walden #castlesintheair #foundations #blueridgemountains #julymorning

One of the unsung heroes of the print shop is the dehumidifier. Our summers are always humid, & increasingly hot. And humidity is no friend to the cast-iron presses & lead-alloy metal type that fills the space. #blueridgemountains #virginia #printshop #shoptalk #letterpress #castiron #metaltype

Late afternoon at the type case… Shop Dog Linji-the-Aussie is exhausted from herding little metal letters all day… #aussie #letterpress #metaltype #shopdog #printshop

Happy birthday, Henry! “I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. It is surprising how contented one can be with nothing definite only a sense of existence....My wealth is not possession but enjoyment.” HDT, December 6, 1856 #thoreau #contentment #otd #americanhistory

What to with bold, old metal type with the disconcerting name of “Empire”? Well, one solution is to beat swords into ploughshares. So I printed up some 72pt Peace with Morris Fuller Benton’s 1930s design. #peace #ploughshares #typedesign #metaltype #printinghistory

“To know the spirit of a place is to realize that you are a part of a part and that the whole is made of parts, each of which is whole. You start with the part you are whole in.” — Gary Snyder, “The Place,The Region,&The Commons” in *The Practice of the Wild* (Counterpoint, 1990) #garysnyder #place

“Find your place on the planet, dig in, and take responsibility from there.” — Gary Snyder, from a footnote in “Four Changes” (1970) #garysnyder #homeplace #blueridgemountains

Reading Gary Snyder this evening —

Toni Morrison is one of the greatest writers to ever live. What many don’t know, is that she was also the first Black woman to become a senior editor at Random House. I wrote about a new book that discusses how she edited by day, wrote by night, and ushered in a new generation of Black writers.

“Big wheel[s] keep on turnin’”… The 1914 Chandler-&-Price printing press coming back to life this morning. After a back injury a couple of years ago, I retired the foot-treadle & now let the motor do the work of keeping this 1500+ pound beast rolling. #letterpress #printing #printshoplife

Have you ever seen the underside of a metal type forme? The bottom of all the letters and spacing material has its own fascinating structure and pattern. (Just make sure it’s locked up tight before taking a look ;-) #letterpress #metaltype

Slowly & carefully distributing the type back into its case, breaking up the clods of words & spacing material & fingering language’s newly-friable ground again. These little silver seeds will sprout something new, in time. #letterpress #language #metaltype #distributing #decomposition #bookmaking

#nokings #woodtype #democracy #freepress

~ creek talked all night long — so smooth, even the moon drowned in that silver tongue ~ (From *Soundings: haiku & carvings* by Emily Hancock, St Brigid Press, 2014) #poetry #creeks #blueridgemountains

~ what is new is tender — gently take the white oak’s hands in yours ~ (From *Falling Into Place*, poems by Emily Hancock, St Brigid Press, 2024) #oak #Quercus #leaves #tenderness #spring #poetry

This is not a drill.

Jamestown is sinking. I got to spend some time with the photographer Greta Pratt's new project, thanks to @placesjournal.bsky.social and the often misremembered line from Heraclitus: “We step into and we do not step into the same rivers. We are and we are not.” placesjournal.org/article/jame...

Sewing tiny books in the print shop bindery (with shop-dog Linji at my side). #sewing #sewingbooks #handsewing #printshop #printshoplife

“My life as essentially belongs to the present as that of a willow tree in the spring.” — Henry David Thoreau A willow tree or, in this case, a Japanese magnolia. The present moment is vast but fleeting; let’s not miss it. #thoreau #spring #magnolia #japanesemagnolia #presentmoment #now

A poem for St Brigid’s Eve, which was last weekend. This and other published poems of mine are offered freely each Sunday on my Substack page emilyehancock.substack.com . #stbrigid #poetry

Together, personally and communally, we can undo the causes and conditions of harm, of violence, of war in speech and action. #unlearnwar #unlearnviolence #donoharm #peacework #together #woodtype

Hello from the frozen tundra just outside the print shop door. I’m taking one sip of steaming coffee, and heading back inside to print. #blueridgemountains #rurallife #january #cold #coffee #gratitude #print #letterpress

Milosz this morning: from “In Warsaw”, collected in *Selected and Last Poems 1931-2004* (Ecco, 2011) #poetry #writing #warsaw #milosz

“Suppose we did our work / like the snow, quietly, quietly, / leaving nothing out.” — Wendell Berry, "Like Snow" from Leavings #snow #work #goodwork #quiet #wendellberry #poetry #writing

Some new poems are slipping into the world now. They’ll fit into your hand. Maybe heart. *Falling Into Place* — 44 short-form poems by moi, with 5 Sumi-ink illuminations by Nancy Maxson. Offset printed interior with a letterpress jacket; handsewn. $16. #poetry #writingcommunity #writing #booksky

Giving myself wide latitude this morning for poetry and lemon cookies washed down with coffee and woodstove warmth. #poetry #milosz #czeslawmilosz #writingcommunity

“Secret” — a poem for this winter weekend by yours truly. #poetry #writing #writingcommunity #winter #secret

Just in time for holiday reading by the woodstove here — the collected poems of Hannah Arendt, translated and edited and introduced by @samantharhill.bsky.social with @genesegrill.bsky.social . #arendt #poetry #writing #hannaharendt

Happy Winter Solstice Eve from the Blue Ridge Mountains

Marguerite Duras on writing: #writing #writingcommunity #duras

“The angels aren’t coming for us— / I just wanted to tell you what happened.” — poem by Aman Rahman #poetry #writingcommunity

Linji, the Print Shop Dog, with #BlueSky eyes. She hangs out with me as I work, waiting for this most boring of jobs to be over for the day. #aussie #letterpress #printshop #dogsofbluesky

“It was night and when we ran into the street, / Mother forgot the cake in the oven, / the bomb smoke mixed with the burnt chocolate / and strawberry.” — Mosab Abu Toha @mosababutoha.bsky.social , from *Forest of Noise* #writing #poetry #gaza #palestine

Mawasi Khan Younis. The moon overhead is not the Moon.

“Troubled places often look to writers in the hope that imagination can see beyond the divisions that ideologies enforce; the writer's job, after all, is to dismantle the very notion of an Other by showing how your hurts belong to me, as my hopes do to you.” — Pico Iyer, *The Half Known Life*

"The secret of life is paying absolute attention to what is going on. The enemy of life is distraction. If you're not present in the present, where the hell are you?" — William Gass #williamgass #thetunnel #payattention #writing #writingcommunity #wordsofwisdom

The first time I took my kid to a poetry reading, it was the amazing Nikki Giovanni. I gave her a note pad, told her to write down anything she wanted to discuss later, & saw her taking notes busily. Turned out she was tallying swear words (91)—who knew poetry could be so funny and fierce?

“…commuter-abacus of main drag strings its headlamps…” I look forward to each day’s vibrant prism of words and images from Dave Borthwick. #poetry #abacus #writingcommunity #writing #naturewriting

I think this is the second thing I ever letterpress printed, some 13 years ago — a favorite from today’s Birthday Girl, Emily Dickinson, who is 194 years young. #emilydickinson #dickinson #livinglanguage #poetry #otd #letterpress #writingcommunity

Happy Publication Day to *What Remains* — the collected poems of Hannah Arendt, translated and introduced by @samantharhill.bsky.social with @genesegrill.bsky.social #poetry #writingcommunity #hannaharendt #arendt

Although Odesa, Ukraine was attacked multiple times this month & there are ongoing issues w/ electricity & heat—Poetry Studio for Kids continues its work —you can find more information at: www.poemsnotbombs.org

“poetry is a trestle spanning the distance between what i feel and what i say” Thank you, Nikki Giovanni, for a lifetime of poetry and power unparalleled. R.I.P. #nikkigiovanni #poetry #writingcommunity

“Walking Into Winter” — a poem for this season by yours truly. #poetry #winter #milkweed #butterflyweed

Cutting down large sheets of wheat-gold paper handmade by St-Armand in Montréal. Thick and topographic, these will become the jackets for a new little book of poems by yours truly. Last photo is of the scoring board I use to mark the jacket’s fold-lines for spine and flaps. #handmadepaper

This is important to click on, to read, to sit and breathe with, to let break open our hearts again and again and again — #writing #writingcommunity #poetry #palestinianwriters #gaza #palestine #literature #warpoetry #now

PEN International has launched an archive to commemorate the lives & work of the many writers so far killed in Gaza. It is a detailed honouring of each person. “I am Nour El Din Adnan Hajjaj, a Palestinian writer, I am 27 years old & I have many dreams...” www.pen-international.org/war-on-write...