Laura Sobbott Ross

The Trees Will Remain Laura Sobbott Ross

Written by the poet laureate of Lake County, Florida, THE TREES WILL REMAIN is a very special book of poetry about Lake County and the vibrant beautiful industry of life within those rolling green hills. It's full of orchids and orange groves and lush heat and longing. It speaks to the underrepresented population of migrant workers whose lives parallel the residents in seasons of want and of plenty. The earth is fertile here, but it's also rife with relics and ghosts. There's a bomb shelter beneath the orchards, and hothouses of conjured exotics. There are coyotes and hurricanes and fruits that hang "like little taunts" at the memory of venturers who lost it all in the citrus industry. But there is also an unbroken spirit here; "I can almost touch the veins of her." Connected beneath us all, there is the ancient aquifer, "a current braiding in the hollows." THE TREES WILL REMAIN was a finalist in the 2019 Richard Snyder Publication Prize at Ashland Poetry Press and also a semi-finalist for the Washington Prize at the Word Works.