To the Editor:
Once in awhile a person emerges in our midst who has such creativity and depth, that knowing them feels like a gift. Such a gift was Kelly Patton Brook.
Last week, after a short illness, Kelly quietly passed from our lives. Those who knew her as a friend grieve. For others, there is the memory of her words and photos, her descriptions of animals who needed homes and shown in her weekly column “All Four Feet.”
Though she wrote primarily about the local animal shelter, the plight of all animals demanded her attention, from dogs and cats, to horses, birds, and wildlife.
She was especially drawn to the endangered African elephants and their struggle to survive. Consequently in 2013, Kelly fulfilled a lifelong dream of visiting Africa. She used her creative skills, combining photos of Africa with computer graphics, to create evocative images which looked like paintings.
Likewise she produced two massive books entitled “Our Animals/Ourselves” and “Whither Thou Goest.”
Many of her photos were printed on tin, an unusual process, and shown in an art show in Damariscotta last spring. Perhaps her most moving book of photos “If Winter Comes” (from a quote by Shelley), was created after the loss of her beloved husband Alexander (Sandy) Brook in 2012.
Those of us who loved her marveled that even in the winter of Kelly’s life, she had turned her sadness into something of art and beauty.
Kelly has been many things: a college professor teaching theater arts, an actress, a writer, a defender of animals, and an artist. She was a true Renaissance woman, but these definitions would miss her essence, for her giving spirit was so much more.
She loved nature and her pond bordered by a fringe of marshy woods, the lovely views of the Sheepscot River from her porch, and her wonderful lupine and wildflower field, nurtured through the years.
She cared for all of the sick and wounded animals at the shelter, and she equally cared for and nurtured her friends in times of trouble—usually arriving in her multi-colored socks, pink sneakers and mismatched clothing, wearing an elflike hat over her small blonde head, ready with a smile, a beautiful feather, a book of poetry, or just an encouraging hug.
At our last Christmas in 2014, she gave me a small intimate book of her photos called “Time: Feather and the Rose.” All of the pictures were beautiful images of birds or flowers, except for one, that of an antique pocket watch.
As I look at it now, it seems prescient; it seems to imply that perhaps she knew time was running out. The last page was a photo of Kelly in a red baseball hat, with the caption: Be Blessed, 2014-2015, Love, Kelly.
As I look at it now, I see Kelly as the rose; see the feather as the flight of her wondrous spirit; and the drop of dew on the rose as the trace of a tear.
I will miss you Kelly. I will miss your touch, your images, your loving and compassionate voice. You were, and always will be, the friend that was one of my lifes’ most treasured gifts.
