HUMBOLDT ARTIST COLLECTIVE
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Vanessa Vrtiak

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​SERVICES:
​Spoken Word,  Key Note Speaker, Writing & Social Justice Workshops​

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About Vanessa

In the daytime, Vanessa serves low income families as a Home Visitor for Northcoast Children's Services. At night, she attends graduate school pursuing her MA in Sociology. She plans on directing a non profit serving people that have suffered from the cycle of incarceration and need support reintegrating back into the community. Vanessa continuously uses her poetry as a tool to promote social activism, but also to remind herself and others how truly precious life. She is currently creating a full length traveling performance that will reach across the country, growing a community garden filled with more love than her two hands can hold, and finishing her sixth chapbook.

Sample work

The Hunger 

There is something about the way you left me 
cracked open
the contents of my chest exposed
like the heart of a sacred book
dog eared and swollen from being read too many times 
the thunder clap still in my bedroom window
a streak of shoe polish down my face
sheets greased from days of disappearance
you uttered my song 
subaqueous in your throat
read it like the Sunday’s funny pages to your friends
you drew bridges from the base line of my soul
and I caught you speaking of our future
and as if all at once
worship crumbled love 
clouds were left heavy with convulsion 
in the deepest fever sweats of summer
you bent me over a picnic table 
had me believe in you
even though you knew we were nearing our end
and in in your thrusting 
I fell from the sky
side split in purple lighting 
my body was something you conquered
yet still a place you promised you would not visit again

  • Home
  • Store
  • Artists
  • Featured
  • Contact
  • Directory
    • Matt Beard
    • John Chapman
    • Piet Dalmolen
    • Amy Day
    • Therese FitzMaurice
    • Anne Fricke
    • Jesse Jonathon
    • Eileen McGee
    • Vanessa Vrtiak
  • Events