The Reach of the Heart is a sequence of poems that explores small epiphanies of ordinary life. These epiphanies mark openings to a larger world that constantly surrounds us, a world that also reaches us through visual symbols like the mythic images in the accompanying series of monotypes. Hidden & revealed elements flow through this series of unique prints; one layer (rock, animal, pond, bone) impressed into the paper, tracks the path of unseen life around us. The painted layer reveals the perceptions of thought and dream. Julia Ferrari & Dan Carr designed the format of the book to unify the journey of the language with the landscape of the images. The title page with its image of the stars of the Milky Way, flanked by the titles of the poems, is meant to suggest the stream of events which were often filled by a conversation between the author and the artist.
One hundred and twenty monotypes were completed for this book on a thirty inch French Tool etching press, in the Winter and Spring of the year as the bare trees shook their limbs across the Ashuelot River in full view of the Studio House windows. The poems were hand-set in Regulus, a type cut by hand by the author, with Fairbanks Italic and Sung type. The book was printed in an edition of forty at Golgonooza Letter Foundry & Press by the author and the artist on Rives BFK made in Isère in Southeastern France near the Alps. The artist bound the edition at Enitharmon Bindery.
