This October, I’ve been in residence at the Millay Colony in Austerlitz, NY, working on my book. Once the home of poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, it’s now a place for writers and artists to come for intense periods of work and wonder, punctuated by long wanderings through the meadows, hills, and forests of Steepletop, Millay’s gorgeous estate in the foothills of the Berkshires.
White with daisies and red with sorrel
And empty, empty under the sky!—
Life is a quest and love a quarrel—
Here is a place for me to lie.
(from “Weeds,” Edna St. Vincent Millay, 1921)