"Words Become Ashes — An Offering" by Cindy Rinne

“Words Become Ashes — An Offering” takes you on a pilgrimage in tunnels, on the ground, and above with mole, Changing Woman, polar bear, whale, and moon. Join an outsider on a journey, but not alone under Waning Quarter Moon with the protection of wolf. Tear out dead leaves and listens to the vibrations of the river. When the door seems closed of loss, letting go, and finding wisdom, “ashen trauma transmutes into music” in these ritual songs. Much for you to discover in the elements, layers, and textures of fiber art and poetry collaged together.

Imagine every dream sheds a skin. Imagine these skins were gathered and sewn together in expert fashion. Imagine these skins spoke. So presents this iridescent collection by Cindy Rinne. Both poet and artist she smooths a texture of experience that calls forth goosebumps. Cindy’s words and images are the shawl one wants to wrap around torso, a visionary quilt one pulls cozy to the neck when longing for home.

—-Kelsey Bryan-Zwick author of Here Go the Knives, forthcoming from Moon Tide Press

The pulse of Earth beats in Cindy Rinne’s poet heart. While close to this planet, she pulls colors out of the cosmos to stitch these deeply moving poems together. What seems so distant/dwells inside my body/a seedling of an unknown planet/ The birth of a moon/knits me to the upper world. The poems are cushioned in Rinne’s colorful quilted artwork. While “Words Become Ashes” we feel ourselves being The Phoenix as the poet resurrects us.

—Alice Pero, author of Thawed Stars, founder of Moonday Reading Series

Cindy Rinne

Cindy Rinne is a San Bernardino artist and poet who has created fine art for over 40 years. She was Poet in Residence for the Neutra Institute Gallery and Museum, Los Angeles, CA. Her poems have appeared in literary journals, anthologies, art exhibits, and dance performances. Cindy is the author of several books: Today in the Forest with Toti O’Brien (Moonrise Press), silence between drumbeats (Four Feathers Press), Knife Me Split Memories (Cholla Needles Press), Letters Under Rock with Bory Thach, (Elyssar Press), and others.
She has participated in several online group exhibitions through LAAA/Gallery825. Cindy had tapestries in “Woven Stories” at MOAH (Lancaster Museum of Art and History) and at RAFFMA at Cal State San Bernardino for “Voices of Ancient Palmyra Resounded.” She participated in “50/50, FIFTY/FIFTY, The Creative Magic of Collaboration” at the Progress Gallery, Pomona, CA. Cindy curated and exhibited at Chaffey Community Museum of Art and the Inland Empire Museum of Art. She exhibited with “Old Broads” curated by Karen Karlsson in several southern California galleries. She has exhibited at the Beatnik Lounge and La Matadora Gallery in Joshua Tree and is represented by Desert Peach Gallery in Yucca Valley, CA.