Hand Shadows
Poetry by Susan Wismer.
Choreography by Michele Green, Suzette Sherman, and David Earle. Photography by David Earle, Michael English, and Michele Green.
In the winter of 2020, believing that the pandemic would soon end, Suzette Sherman and Michele Green, of Passionate Heart—Women’s Stories Through Dance, invited Susan Wismer, poet, to join with them in creating a collaborative performance. The upheavals and uncertainties of the Covid-19 period brought into sharp relief the importance of community, collaborative effort and artistic expression during difficult times. After many delays and changes of plans, three live performances of Hand Shadows took place during 2021 and 2022.
Hand Shadows, the chapbook is one small and important contribution to a growing literature that documents the innovations of the pandemic period and reflects on how to carry that inspiration forward. In a brief 46 pages, the book offers to readers the poems, still photos from the dances as visual poems, and a discussion of the process of artistic creation. It will be of particular interest to readers interested in cross-genre collaboration and in building community through the arts. It is a timely reminder of what the arts can do, as source of resistance and renewal.
https://www.wintergreenstudios.com/titles/hand-shadows
Hand Shadows is now available for purchase on Amazon!
Praise for Hand Shadows
“Grace. Reverence. Endurance. All told in picture and poetry, a perfect pas de deux.”
-Gail Sidonie Šobat, author, How the Light is Spent
“Words fail me. Almost. At some point I may be able to tell you how and why your words combined with these photos have such a profound, inspiring effect on me. For now, all I can say is that they do. Thank you.”
-Annie Deeley, author, Who Would Believe?
“The poetry opened hearts as well as doors and windows”
-David Earle, choreographer and dancer, Dancetheatre David Earle
Hag Dances
Poetry Susan Wismer
Published by At Bay Press,
Winnipeg, MB.
May 29, 2025
To change and heal takes great courage. To reconcile is to truly face yourself and ask the questions: Why am I angry, shameful, hateful and prejudiced? Why does fear have control of me so profoundly? Why is it so easy to move to prejudice, to be manipulative, to think of myself as better than? Susan Wismer’s new collection of astounding poetry reconciles identity and truth, if truth can even be found.
Canadian orders should be placed through our distributor UTP.
https://utpdistribution.com/ordering-customer-service/
https://atbaypress.com/books/detail/hag-dances
Advance Praise for Hag Dances
“Words here push out of silence as if they’ve just been born, gleaming with newness and a startled beauty.”
-Lorna Crozier, author of After That
"Astonishing to watch her “long song soar,” as this full collection lands and roosts.
-Ariel Gordon, author of Siteseeing: Writing nature and climate across the prairies.
“Wismer’s poetry gleams like a light in a dark wood” -Mary Barnes, author of Moving Upstream
“…birth and death, wisdom and folly, love and loss” -Bianca Lakoseljac, editor Rudy Wiebe: Essays on His Works; author, Silence Is Full of Sound
“These barefoot poems swing through a muscular crone hagiography, shape-shifting their ways through all the best dances. Wismer’s poetic sparseness makes visible a filigreed layer of resilience”.
-Tanis MacDonald, author of Straggle: Adventures in Walking while Female