In the Company of Women An Interview with Alicia Winski and Apryl Skies by Tracie Skarbo
Recently, I had the opportunity to pose some questions to two inspirational writers, Apryl Skies and Alicia Winski, about their latest project. With a new anthology called, In the Company of Women, due out in 2012, they are proud to celebrate the subject of women and what it means to live as one. These two wonderfully creative women believe that payback to the art
community as a whole is part of the journey. The latest website Calliope’s Closet, celebrates women in the arts and gives them an avenue in which to display their work beautifully. The following is the result of the internet
interview.
Tracie: Can you tell us a little about your latest project: In the Company of Women, and how the concept came about?
Alicia: I’m not sure exactly when, I think late 2008 or midway through 2009, I had started a piece called “In The Company of Women”. It was born of my own contemplation regarding my ever changing view of my relationships with women and the place they were fitting into my life as friends. I had never had many female friends throughout my life and over the past few years found myself developing friendships with women that were not only unexpected but surprisingly comforting and enlightening. However, the poem seemed to outgrow me and I felt it necessary to add another voice. So I turned to one of the women who I had developed a dear friendship with, Apryl Skies and we decided to collaborate. Eventually, we both realized that the concept had outgrown us both and that the project was one that should be voiced by a choir of women and not just a duet. So, In the Company was born.
Apryl: I have to give credit to Alicia for this one, she approached me with an idea for a conversational, women's poetry anthology, however I am not certain either of us anticipated the gravity of this idea. It has been a pretty incredible experience. The project has taken on a life of its own really. It's not so much conversational as it is poetry meets memoir. What is poetry but memoir to some extent?
Tracie: What has been the biggest inspiration for this collection?
Apryl: The biggest inspiration for me was seeing certain themes emerge and unfold between seemingly unrelated poems/poets, stories or memoir and finding them fusing together ideals and perspective. We have women from all over the world and it has been a truly an inspiring collaboration.
Alicia: For me personally? Oh, definitely the fact that we are being privileged to share the work, the joys and the friendships of so many enlightened and talented women who again,
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