Guest comments

Roseanne

I am hoping that one day I can come up with my little cocker spaniel for one week. It looks glorious.

Torina Gonzalez

I have been writing for years and have been dreaming about visiting "My Retreat" for sometime now. I can't believe I am so close in going!!!!

Suzanne

Thank you for the wonderful stay! I had the peace I needed so much to finish my book. Now all I need is a publisher! Keep up the good work...would love to come up in the winter and ski.
Best wishes
Suzanne K.

Melanie Cheroff

The artists' retreat area sounds like a great idea! A friend and I are interested in coming next week, but I am having difficulty contacting you. When I click on "contact us", I get a message saying that an e-mail address must be given. However, I don't see anywhere to put my e-mail address in relation to the "contact us" button. (I am fairly new to web site navigation) Also I wondered
if there were a phone # we could call about reservations.
Thank you, Melanie

Olana Koss

Great Web site!
Is that Ukrainian on the Ukrainian site? I know how to read and write Ukrainian (born in Canada) and other than the title it looked like Greek to me. Would love to get in touch with North American writers with Ukrainian background.

Gloria Stout

What a great web site!
Just loved the music, the colors, and the set up. Will save it in favorites and read the material when I have time to really read them in depth. Great work! Keep it up!
Gloria

Nick Mourarsh

Dear Cora,
Congratulations! I have been wandering through your site. It looks great! I am also proud and happy that the Ukrainian version of "My Retreat" is open for visitors. Luck and happiness in "My Retreat"!

Lisa

What a great website! You want more? Visit My Retreat in person! It's the best place to get the 3R's (Reading, Riting 'n Rest)!!!!

Shannon

I AM A FAIRLY YOUNG AND NEW WRITER, SO THIS WEB SITE HAS CAPTURED MY ATTENTION. I FEEL CONFORTABLE NAVAGATING THROUGH THE INFORMATION THAT IS NOT ONLY INTRESTING BUT EDUCATIONAL...THAN YOU MY RETREAT.KEEP IT COMING.

Stephanie

Each time I visit My Retreat I come away refreshed and centered. Sometimes I need the stimulation of another writer, and at those times I find someone there to whom I relate. Other times I find the peace and quiet I need to focus, and there it is. My Retreat is truly a magic place.

Samuel

I thoroughly enjoyed this site...keep up the good work. Will send a submission of poetry soon

Irina Prisyazhnyuk

I was really glad to see your web site! It looks very humane as there are pictures of people in it. It helps to understand the poetry if you can take a look at the person who wrote it. It is already rather big and I hope it will grow with the time as many new people will join in. Best of luck in the future!!!!!

IH

Just a line to tell you how much I enjoyed staying at My Retreat last weekend. You created such a welcoming, cozy and relaxed atmosphere.

D&G

Thank you for the pleasure of staying in this fabulous piece of paradise. It was more than we imagined it would be.

AF

I want you to know how much I enjoyed staying at My Retreat. It was just what I needed to work on my novel...and as it happens, I finished my first draft.

NG

We were able to find the peace and solitude we were seeking.

Vera Schwartz

Dear Cora,
I am sending you the poem harvest made possible by your cabin, this retreat, truly mine. These three days have been deeply solitary. I took walks up the hill and this afternoon was rewarded by a strolling couple of wild turkeys, imperially making their way through ferns. Totally silent. Their young scurried a bit, closer to the grass. Then I went to the big house, needing a change of pace. I sat in the gracious living room, picking up books below the table, read through Rose Sasanoff’s poems and started Pat Carr’s stories. Both quiet marvelous, hitting the spot after the rather dull collection I had brought with me.

You have provided what I needed, even without being here!!! You have created a community for those who come to savor nature and explore their innermost thoughts. I have not belonged much to writer’s groups, yet found myself so gladly among your guests-friends-writers who draw sustenance from your vision. You and I spoke so briefly on Sunday before you left and I was grateful that you sensed my need for solitude and for your genuine effort to make me feel at home in the cabin.

So, Cora my dear, thank you. Add this letter to the many you must get. I have a dream/image to return here for my 60th birthday with 3 or 4 of my closest women friends for a couple of days of talk and art. I will always be grateful for having read about you in the Holy City in a journal about poetry. This summer when I feel especially blue about not going back to Israel, these few days of isolation, even loneliness allowed me to map both my grief and hope...

Blurring the lines
Trying hard to see the tips of ferns,
one weathered blade of grass,
a stodgy tower of a weed,
one purple blossom
closed on itself in rain
and the brash marguerites
both great and small
projecting white spears
around a yellow swelling...

I end up in watery depths
that make of stems a verdant soup.
The fern still solitary in the bottle
perfecting its spores,
the details on which redemption hangs-
no second matter this.

Editors Note: Vera is a professor of East Asian Studies at Wesleyan University and has taught at the Truman Institute of Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Vivina Ciolli

My Retreat: Late Morning
The only sound I hear from here
stirring, whirring humid air
mneh-enid mneh-enia, mneh-enid mneh-enia
the ceiling fan fanning low
droning me awake to midday sun.

Escaping to this place of peace
Without the stress and fear of daily life
delights my body and I stretch both arms
toward sides of bed still cool
relax my thoughts, my soul.
Joy is in this day, one
set aside to celebrate my life
lift lazy as I like.
Oh, the glory of awakening at any time
and never being late.

info@myretreat.net
845-436-7455
P.O. Box 1077
South Fallsburg, NY 12779

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