Kagean Ni House Proposal (Updated, November 5, 2024)
We envision a literary arts/bioregional knowledge center in rural Western Washington. Kagean Ni would be an unofficial Cascadia Headquarters, would aid researchers by creating a library focused on Cascadia topics and would help poets live the life of a poet 24/7 in a manner that would honor the spirit, work, and life of Sam Hamill, the late Founder of Copper Canyon Press. Sam was a poet, translator and friend of the organization who built a home outside of Port Townsend and named it “Shadow Hermitage” or “Kagean.” This center would give a physical space again to stage the organization’s commitment to a spontaneous/place-based and embodied poetics as an antidote to the speed of capital and the current “attention fracking” efforts of giant social media corporations. We see how this practice shifts the paradigm away from the abstractions and generalizations of Western culture to reconnect humans to the biosphere and the bioregion.
In addition to the cultural aspect, the project has a strong land preservation component and will include an effort to bring a diversity of poets, authors, and students together who write from the voice of the land in our region. We envision workshops, authors in residence, community readings and events, and providing access to a rural Washington retreat center for those who may not have had that opportunity, including BIPOC poets.
The house would serve as bioregional knowledge center, retreat center for the CPL Board and other organizations and communities, a place for extended workshops, individual literary retreats putting poets of color and others at the margin first, for CPL events and events sympathetic to the CPL mission of “Empowering people to practice poetry and deepen connections to place, self and the present moment.” We envision a center that would host, cultural events, retreats, writing workshops, computer literacy classes and natural medicine events. We were delighted to receive the poetry collection of Richard Osler, a B.C. poet, workshop facilitator and participant in the Poetry Postcard Fest. 97 bankers boxes full of poetry books was successfully put in storage on October 28, 2024. We are grateful to Richard and his estate for this gift. It is the seed of our Kagean Ni library. Hear Richard talk at AWP-Seattle about the Poetry Postcard Fest here.
The ideal property has a house with kitchen, bathrooms, a large area that could be used for group workshops, yoga/meditation retreats, small cabins on the property to house visitors as well as campsites. Estimated budget: $2.2M for the property, construction and upgrades. (An additional $2.2M for the first ten years of operations to perfect the business model.) The priorities of the house would reflect CPL and Sam Hamill’s dedication to peace, wisdom traditions, translation, consciousness, poetry of place and poetics.
Born in 1943, Sam Hamill was raised in Utah, attended the University of California–Santa Barbara, where he served as editor of the university’s literary magazine. In 1972, with money awarded for editorial excellence, he co-founded Copper Canyon Press. Sam wrote numerous books of poetry, four books of literary prose, edited several volumes of poetry and published several books of translations. Editor of Copper Canyon Press for 34 years, he founded Poets Against the War, a movement of poets protesting the invasion of Iraq. Sam received numerous honors and awards, including fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the NEA, and the U.S.-Japan Friendship Commission, as well as the First Amendment Award from PEN USA, and two Washington Governor’s Arts Awards. He died in Anacortes, Washington, on April 14, 2018.
Sam Hamill Photographed by Ian Boyden
