The Caving Grounds

Kathleen Heideman is a passionate, persistent and well-informed advocate for the natural world and human flourishing, in the face of irresponsible resource extraction and environmental degradation in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

She’s also a visual artist, and a mad-skills poet.

Her new book is “The Caving Grounds,” an eloquent account of her decades-long effort to understand and document the damage wrought by underground mining in and around Negaunee, Michigan (the book is available now for pre-order).

The Caving Grounds is much more than an exemplary collection of poems: it’s a thoroughly researched, and visceral, account of the human and physical devastation imposed by 181 (and counting) years of intensive resource extraction in the Upper Peninsula.

Below, an excerpt:

Heideman’s book launch reading of The Caving Grounds will take place on Tuesday April 1 at 6:30 p.m. at the Peter White Public Library in Marquette, MI, followed by a book signing. The reading kicks off the Library’s Great Lakes Poetry Festival. This event is free and open to the public.