Permanent Camp: Poems, Narratives and Renderings from the Smokies

Walking west of Bryson City, North Carolina, on July 1, 1976, George and Elizabeth Ellison happened upon a magical cove tucked into Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It held a small house of many windows, a shining creek, a tree-lined meadow and a pathway into a dark forest. They moved in for the summer and never left, defying Kephart’s notion that all camps are temporary. For nearly forty years, this secluded spot has been the touchstone of their work as author and artist. These interrelated poems, narratives, renderings, notes and paintings form an artistic whole in praise of the outer and inner landscapes within which we all reside.