Praise for Kate's Speaking and Teaching
"Kate Buckley is well deserving of the title of Laguna Beach’s first Poet Laureate. She skillfully and wonderfully opened the eyes of our teens and tweens to a world of expression that many of them hadn’t fully grasped and some didn’t know existed. She flipped the script on those who jokingly wrote words that were meant to derail the group, when in actuality they were forms of poetry that allowed for a whimsical yet powerful approach to personal expression. It was a pleasure and an honor to have Kate put on a work shop for our teens and we thank her for the magic that she fostered here at The Club.” —Greg Bridgeman, Education Initiatives Director, Boys and Girls Club of Laguna Beach
"Kate Buckley's work touched our people here in many ways. They have talked about her poise, warmth, grace, energy, enthusiasm and her engagement of USLI’s CARE2 values into the curriculum. Kate is a talented speaker and teacher who embodied our CARE2 values as she coached, and made it fun for everyone! Great job!" - Manus Friel, Senior Vice President, USLI, A Berkshire Hathaway Company
"Thank you so much for participating in our 85th Anniversary celebration yesterday. You did an amazing job! Your poem was uplifting, insightful and captured the essence of the Festival of Arts/Pageant of the Masters. Thank you again!" —Sharbie Higuchi, Marketing/Public Relations Director, Festival of the Arts/Pageant of the Masters
"Kate’s poetic engagements delivered cerebral inspiration to the Sawdust Art Festival and her poetry workshop for children illuminated the minds of our young patrons. Thank you, Kate and friends for enriching our summer festival! Congratulations Kate, Poet Laureate, for being a wonderful ambassador to the city of Laguna Beach!" —Franky Duschane, Marketing & PR Coordinator, Sawdust Festival
Praise for Follow Me Down
"Vivid, passionate, pulsing with life in the face of loss and pain, these incantations bravely seek to void The Void. They are poems to conjure with."
- Charles Harper Webb
"15th century painter Cennini spoke of the art of 'unseen things hidden in the shadow of natural ones.' Like 'a sea turning in on itself' Kate Buckley's poems speak to this, moving together, folding and unfolding the echoes of a voice in place, a voice out of place, 'salt licking salt-/coming home.' Follow Me Down maps out the geography of longing where sometimes 'you walk the yellow fields,' sometimes 'the moon sets itself on fire,' lighting up the distances between the past and the future. Buckley's parenthetical considerations, her ache and intellect coincide in a sensuous, revelatory motioning toward that inspired sanctuary of who we are."
- Elena Karina Byrne
"She is making her mark on the landscape of contemporary American poetry."
- Molly Peacock
"This is a book where simplicity meets a siren named Kate Buckley and is all the better for it."
— Radius
- Charles Harper Webb
"15th century painter Cennini spoke of the art of 'unseen things hidden in the shadow of natural ones.' Like 'a sea turning in on itself' Kate Buckley's poems speak to this, moving together, folding and unfolding the echoes of a voice in place, a voice out of place, 'salt licking salt-/coming home.' Follow Me Down maps out the geography of longing where sometimes 'you walk the yellow fields,' sometimes 'the moon sets itself on fire,' lighting up the distances between the past and the future. Buckley's parenthetical considerations, her ache and intellect coincide in a sensuous, revelatory motioning toward that inspired sanctuary of who we are."
- Elena Karina Byrne
"She is making her mark on the landscape of contemporary American poetry."
- Molly Peacock
"This is a book where simplicity meets a siren named Kate Buckley and is all the better for it."
— Radius
Praise for A Wild Region
"A Wild Region is a family history in verse as well as a lovely elegy for Buckley's grandmother set in a Kentucky that is both pastoral and industrial: 'I have ridden on horseback / under the harvest moon, gold and heavy' vs. 'the coughs that stained your linens black / no matter how many times you bleached them.' Interspersed are the poet's own paintings, similarly patterned: pale impressionist shimmers plus brusque expressionist impasto. The elegies are especially moving: 'her wispy hair, fine as floss / cotton against the pale earth of her skull' and 'I cradle her, cradle her, and rock her home.' Pick up this book. (Buckley won this year's Hearst Poetry Prize.)
- North American Review
"Kate Buckley's poems are dark prayers and lyrical ballads, infused with mystery and awe... And the stories these poems tell-finely crafted as the poems are-are stories that speak to all of us, accessible and clear for all their complicated depth, 'universal' precisely because they're so deeply personal, and so deeply felt. There is so much stunning language in this collection, so much accuracy and grace, and there are so many images that take my breath away... Kate Buckley shows us how the beautiful and the brutal can not only coexist alongside one another, but exist within one another. Hers is a necessary and welcome new voice."
- Cecilia Woloch
"Painting and poetry are two art forms that stand side by side and work well together. A Wild Region is a collection of oil paintings and poetry from prolific poet Kate Buckley, whose work has appeared in countless venues. Many of her poems are opposite full color art, adding a fresh dimension to her work. A Wild Region is a fine blend of artforms, highly recommended. 'On Hearing Your News': My eyes lie flat in my skull,/darkened, bruised//lashes whip-stitched to swollen lids-/sleep has once again been elusive.//My organs weigh more/than they did the day before,/swollen with unhappiness,/gorged with regret:/tiny fists in my stomach pummeling/ the hanging ball of my heart."
- Midwest Book Review (Reviewer's Choice)
"A ribbon of Appalachia winds through Kate Buckley's vigorous voice in her debut collection of poems, A Wild Region. It was my pleasure to choose her as the winner of the 2008 James Hearst Poetry Prize for the North American Review, and it is an equal pleasure to welcome this book of poems, crafted from the patterns of speech of the wild region Buckley loves and the wildness of its people, too."
- Molly Peacock
"Many of the poems recall the work of poet Andrew Hudgins, both for their subject matter and use of forms... Like Hudgins, Buckley can convey the physical and emotional violence of characters without apology, presenting people as they were and laying bare their choices without too much explanation...W.H. Auden once said 'a poem is like a story . . . with all the boring parts left out.' Buckley certainly has many stories to tell, of birth and deaths, abandonment and murder. And she is a gifted storyteller... Perhaps, this is Buckley’s intent in many of her poems-to take the chaotic and random pieces and make them fit, make them record a life, like a handmade quilt. Buckley's poems are as beautiful and well-crafted."
- The Adirondack Review
"Kate Buckley's A Wild Region, exemplifies what is best about American poetry: honest, clear, fluid, and genuine. A Wild Region, is a strong debut collection that deserves a place on every poet's bookshelf.
- Marie C. Lecrivain
"This is a book of poems full of clues—clues more satisfying even than answers, since they point us toward the wilder regions of the complex human heart. Like a heady night in the rural South, these poems are sonorous, delicious, and dark-at once comforting and mysterious, wicked and sweet."
- Robert Peake
"True to her Kentucky roots, Kate Buckley is a born storyteller with a poet's transforming vision of the world's details informed by loss and exile."
- Julie Kuzneski Wrinn for the Betty Gabehart Prize, Kentucky Women Writers Conference
"In A Wild Region, Kate Buckley explores the connections between landscape, memory and history...Buckley's style is perfect for this task."
- Poetix.net: Poetry for Southern California
"Buckley is a firm believer in the value of the myths and legends that have been handed down through time and that reveal essential truths about who we are, providing a common thread of humanity that links past, present and future generations. She tries to give a sense of that in her poetry. So that while the poems in her book are set in her native Kentucky and are evocative of the hard and often desperate lives of Appalachian people to whom black lung and hunger were all too familiar, she emphasizes that they are indicative of a collective experience-stories of love and loss that everyone can relate to."
- Laguna Beach Independent
- North American Review
"Kate Buckley's poems are dark prayers and lyrical ballads, infused with mystery and awe... And the stories these poems tell-finely crafted as the poems are-are stories that speak to all of us, accessible and clear for all their complicated depth, 'universal' precisely because they're so deeply personal, and so deeply felt. There is so much stunning language in this collection, so much accuracy and grace, and there are so many images that take my breath away... Kate Buckley shows us how the beautiful and the brutal can not only coexist alongside one another, but exist within one another. Hers is a necessary and welcome new voice."
- Cecilia Woloch
"Painting and poetry are two art forms that stand side by side and work well together. A Wild Region is a collection of oil paintings and poetry from prolific poet Kate Buckley, whose work has appeared in countless venues. Many of her poems are opposite full color art, adding a fresh dimension to her work. A Wild Region is a fine blend of artforms, highly recommended. 'On Hearing Your News': My eyes lie flat in my skull,/darkened, bruised//lashes whip-stitched to swollen lids-/sleep has once again been elusive.//My organs weigh more/than they did the day before,/swollen with unhappiness,/gorged with regret:/tiny fists in my stomach pummeling/ the hanging ball of my heart."
- Midwest Book Review (Reviewer's Choice)
"A ribbon of Appalachia winds through Kate Buckley's vigorous voice in her debut collection of poems, A Wild Region. It was my pleasure to choose her as the winner of the 2008 James Hearst Poetry Prize for the North American Review, and it is an equal pleasure to welcome this book of poems, crafted from the patterns of speech of the wild region Buckley loves and the wildness of its people, too."
- Molly Peacock
"Many of the poems recall the work of poet Andrew Hudgins, both for their subject matter and use of forms... Like Hudgins, Buckley can convey the physical and emotional violence of characters without apology, presenting people as they were and laying bare their choices without too much explanation...W.H. Auden once said 'a poem is like a story . . . with all the boring parts left out.' Buckley certainly has many stories to tell, of birth and deaths, abandonment and murder. And she is a gifted storyteller... Perhaps, this is Buckley’s intent in many of her poems-to take the chaotic and random pieces and make them fit, make them record a life, like a handmade quilt. Buckley's poems are as beautiful and well-crafted."
- The Adirondack Review
"Kate Buckley's A Wild Region, exemplifies what is best about American poetry: honest, clear, fluid, and genuine. A Wild Region, is a strong debut collection that deserves a place on every poet's bookshelf.
- Marie C. Lecrivain
"This is a book of poems full of clues—clues more satisfying even than answers, since they point us toward the wilder regions of the complex human heart. Like a heady night in the rural South, these poems are sonorous, delicious, and dark-at once comforting and mysterious, wicked and sweet."
- Robert Peake
"True to her Kentucky roots, Kate Buckley is a born storyteller with a poet's transforming vision of the world's details informed by loss and exile."
- Julie Kuzneski Wrinn for the Betty Gabehart Prize, Kentucky Women Writers Conference
"In A Wild Region, Kate Buckley explores the connections between landscape, memory and history...Buckley's style is perfect for this task."
- Poetix.net: Poetry for Southern California
"Buckley is a firm believer in the value of the myths and legends that have been handed down through time and that reveal essential truths about who we are, providing a common thread of humanity that links past, present and future generations. She tries to give a sense of that in her poetry. So that while the poems in her book are set in her native Kentucky and are evocative of the hard and often desperate lives of Appalachian people to whom black lung and hunger were all too familiar, she emphasizes that they are indicative of a collective experience-stories of love and loss that everyone can relate to."
- Laguna Beach Independent