petalridge.com
the website of
Derek Kannemeyer
Light verse & animal trivia, December 2022, ISBN-13: 979-8367906226
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Photography/Nonfiction, July & September 2021, ISBN-13: 978-1006490187
“A powerful photographic testament to a series of inspiring protests… Across eight chronological chapters, anchored with expansive notes throughout, Kannemeyer presents an astounding photographic catalog of changes… A stirring record of anti-racism in a Southern city. —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Silver Medal Winner, IPPY Awards, Best Non-Fiction Book, Mid-Atlantic Region.
Honored with a full scale photography exhibition at the Black History
Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia, September-December 2021.
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Listed by Kirkus Reviews as one of the 100 Best Indie Books of 2022.
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The hardback is available only from me or from Amazon; the $7.99 PDF, which can
be read as an e-book, is available only from the printer, blurb.com.
Poetry, fall 2021/spring 2022, ISBN-13: 978-1734602494
For publisher information for these five works and for my other book-length projects, including Stalking Crawlrollies, The Play of Gilgamesh, The Flap Over Tree Debris Island, An Alphabestiary, and the Blue Nib Chapbook, please click on the PUBLICATIONS tab.
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About the Site Name
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"Petal Ridge" (in my fanciful conceit) describes the array of P-topics across my menu bar. It was originally a name I came up with in 2017, for a pickerel weed and lotus plant patch in Forest Hill Park where the lake insects like to perch. I'd just begun taking photographs. I coined it for a hybrid prose poem/photography sequence called "Zoom Lens." (You can read a few sections of "Zoom Lens" in the PIC LIT section, under the POTPOURRI tab.) The banner image at the top of the portal page dates from the same year, in our garden. There's a Pic Lit sonnet that goes with it. (You can find it under POTPOURRI, at the PORTRAITS subheading.)
PLACES TO GO, PATHS TO PERUSE: site navigation tips
What we have here is a multi-purpose site.
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I am (for instance) a poet, a photographer, a playwright, a performer, and a puzzle master.
There are arts I practice seriously, and there are pursuits at which I play. So this site contains, or will eventually contain: (1) a professional sector; (2) an amusement park; (3) an archive.
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(1) At tabs such as POETRY, PAPERBACK WRITER, PHOTOGRAPHY, and PLAYHOUSE, I promote and publicize my PROFESSIONAL work. If that's what you came here for, you are advised to head straight there. Elsewhere, there be potholes!
(2) The "Potpourri" heading breaks into subcategories such as "Pic Lit," "Prose pieces," and "Periodicals" (a list of the journals, etc, which have published some of my shorter work).
(3) In "Playground" I kick back more, though there is considerable overlap. For instance: "Party Pieces" features my light verse writing, but some light verse work may also show up under "Pic Lit." "Performance" will contains links to a few online posts of me reading or performing—mostly, but always, I'll be presenting serious work. "Puzzle Palace" focuses on word square puzzles, with other assorted kinds to follow—go ✓ it out! And "Projects" may prove to be the least predictable tab of them all. I'll share unfinished follies. And probably some (semi?) completed ones!
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(4) By all means, visit the "Past Glories" section and browse the archives. You may find it to be more of a storage space than a display area, though. "Parlez-vous" will warehouse materials from my career as a French teacher: song lyrics, comic sketches, translated short plays, etc. In the "Prose archives" and the "Poetry archives" I'll eventually collect a bunch of the previously published work I have no plans to republish. I'll probably toss in some never published work which still intrigues me, but that I don't expect to put out in a book.
Which leaves this page (the "Portal") and the "Pnews" section, which are for Practical Matters. They are my welcome center and my help desk. On both pages, there's a "Ping me" link you can use to contact me. In "Pnews," I'll announce any new site posts, and I'll tell you what's going on right now in my professional world: publications, press, planned appearances, and so on. As the pnews becomes old news, and the page gets too cumbersome, I'll delete some items, and archive others under the subheading "pnews crevés." (This is a bilingual pun. I like puns.)
Artist Profile
Derek's short form writing has appeared in scores of publications from Fiction International to Rolling Stone. He was a career teacher of French, English, and Creative Writing, and over the decades he also worked professionally in theater, principally as an actor.
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After retiring from teaching he began to publish longer form works, in some of which he incorporates visual art, most notably reflecting his recent interest in photography. For much more about his poetry and his picture-taking, his plays, his prose writings, and his passion projects, please hit the relevant tabs.​
