‘Sunset Seagull’ by James Tweedie, featured in ‘Sidekicks: Visions of the Pacifi c Northwest.’
Continued from Page 4
“It’s a human statement. It says I care,”
he said. “These are diffi cult times, every-
thing seems to split up and everyone’s angry.
It’s nice to set it aside and write a poem.”
Connected by poetry
The book opens with a preface that
states, “Both artists scratch at the surface
of the road less traveled, because inter-
pretation also remains fl exible and defi n-
able to each person’s private refl ections.”
The pair’s different backgrounds
infl uenced their relationship to poetry.
Tweedie is a pastor and Campiche a pot-
ter. They refl ect on their experiences
through writing.
Campiche started writing poems in
high school. He has spent 60 years since
practicing. Campiche said the similarity
between pottery and poetry is that they
both take years of practice. When writing,
he often references a lesson he learned
from the famous ceramic artist Toshiko
Takaezu — you’ll need to throw away the
fi rst 10,000 pieces you make.
Tweedie also began writing poetry in
high school. He was able to practice in
ministry, mostly writing song lyrics. He’s
recently taken poetry more seriously.
Within the last fi ve years, he started pub-
lishing his work through his own press,
the Dunecrest Press. “Sidekicks” is
Tweedie’s third collection of poetry. He
has also published six novels and a col-
lection of short stories on Long Beach,
Washington.
As for their friendship, Tweedie said
“as long as he keeps cooking me break-
fast,” they’ll get along just fi ne.
“Food leads people to good friend-
ships. S o does good wine but this is a dif-
ferent front altogether,” Campiche said.
‘Koi fi sh in pond with leaves’ by David Campiche is included in ‘Sidekicks: Visions of the Pacifi c
Northwest.’
THURSDAY, AUGUST 13, 2020 // 5