Resident artist gives back to NH community she visited

By Lois Mittino Gray

Mallory Rodenberg spent two weeks last May living in New Harmony as the Robert Lee Blaffer Foundation Artist-in-Residence to write and revise the last half of her debut poetry collection entitled “Spark Alive.” She resided in the aptly-named Poet’s House and said she must’ve walked over thirty miles of the streets in that time, just thinking and recharging, delving deep into her creativity. On Wednesday, November 12, the public is invited to a poetry reading of ten of her works, with a question and answer period afterwards, at the Working Men’s Institute to listen to the fruits of her labor.

“I’ve always found inspiration in New Harmony’s idyllic-yet-mysterious environment, its solitude and beauty, and I think it benefitted my manuscript beyond measure,” Rodenberg reflected. She used her residency to work toward finishing the collection which will contain approximately forty-two poems, unified by themes of childhood, geography, the mystery of the cosmos, and music. Rodenberg’s goal is to have the project ready for submission to publishers in time to enter some poetry contests with deadlines in February. “It’s about 90 percent finished,” she said.

At the library reading, the Haubstadt native will share anecdotes about “my journey toward writing and my formative experiences.” For example, music plays a role in her poetry after her brother, Matthew, passed away when she was almost eleven years old. “He loved heavy metal music, which I didn’t really care for, but I listened to all his albums to understand him more and that is in my poems.”

A manuscript featuring the first twenty poems from the collection has already received significant acclaim, winning the 2023 Levis Prize from Friends of Writers. Prize judge Eugenia Leigh praised the work’s “sharp eye, clear voice, and masterful control of syntax and tension”. Leigh noted the collection “pulls us into a life littered with loss yet pierced with unexpected tenderness,” adding that “even in the poems with narratives rooted in trauma, the poet transforms the subject through deep attention to music.”

Rodenberg, who holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Warren Wilson College in Swannanoa, North Carolina and a BA in English from the University of Southern Indiana, has long drawn inspiration from our local area. She remembers visiting New Harmony with friends when she was younger to shop and attend Kunstfest, explore the trails, and maybe even sneak into the New Harmony Inn pool for a quick dip. She recalls meeting Jane Blaffer Owen, the town’s patron, as a teenager. “My girlfriends and I were smoking cigarettes and walking around. Mrs. Owen stopped in her little golf cart and talked to us. She had a lovely bouquet of flowers on the seat next to her. She looked at us and said, ‘If you smoke, you can’t smell my flowers.’ I thought about her words for a long time after.”

Rodenberg is an Adult Basic Education Instructor helping her students earn a GED. She teaches at Ivy Tech Community College on campus and in Princeton twice a week. “I teach English and Reading, but now they have added Math, too. I never thought I would teach math, but now I’ve discovered I can do something new.” She also volunteered as a Writing Instructor at the Branchville Correctional Facility last fall. She was inspired by the story of her friend who was incarcerated for ten years and found writing which helped to heal and redeem him after getting out of prison.

She has poems published in several journals and has won awards and honors for her work. Her poems have appeared in publications such as The Swannanoa Review, Leon Literary Review, American Journal of Poetry, Shō Poetry Journal, and Measure.

Rodenberg lives in Evansville with her family. Her husband, Aaron, is a home remodeler who has had several jobs to do in New Harmony. They have two daughters. Daphne is 12 and Wednesday is 10.

During the poetry reading, the poetess looks forward to meeting everyone. Ideas for future projects for her include possibly offering a free writing workshop next spring and doing some research for a poem she wants to write on the two-headed calf upstairs in the WMI Museum. “There is a tag on it that says the WMI acquired the specimen the year Charlie Sloniker came to town. I’ve looked him up and can find no reference to him anywhere yet. Who is Charlie Sloniker anyway?”