In sixth-grade French class, I saw a movie called “La Criniere Blanche” (The White Mane) about a boy living in the Camargue region of southern France.

Being a horse-crazy young girl, I was transfixed by the idea of a wild region where herds of white horses ran free. The images stayed with me for decades.

Then, one day as I was driving into the parking lot of the neighborhood QFC grocery store, I encountered a wild-eyed musician. In my head.

One poem grew into another. One character led to another. And that landscape gave birth to a made-up myth about the lost daughter of Ra. All absolutely fiction (although friends and Internet research helped a lot).

The poems work best together, and so I’ve put In the Mane of a White Horse up on the sofa. I hope you enjoy the poems. And I hope someday to visit the Camargue.