Pumpkin House USA has published a June 2007 newsletter chronicling Pumpkin House India's recent growth. You can download it here. To learn more about the history and past activities of our organization, click here to download the 2006 newsletter.

The cover of Coleman Barks' Back from Afghanistan CD

"Back from Afghanistan," a CD recording with Coleman Barks reading Rumi's poetry, is now available for purchase. All proceeds go to Pumpkin House for Children USA.

The reading took place last spring in Barks' home town, Athens, Georgia, at the Seeney-Stovall Chapel. The recording consists of 11 poems with stories, commentary, and musical accompaniment. CDs are $12 each plus shipping and $10 each for purchases of five CDs or more.

To place an order, contact Charlie Gard'ner at 706-546-6492 or by e-mail at arangaon@aol.com.

Coleman Barks has become a primary force in bringing the mystical Sufi poetry of Rumi into English. The has translated and published 15 collections of RumiÍs poems, including Rumi: The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstacy and Long (2003) and The Illuminated Rumi (1997). Barks is a poet in his own right and a teacher of contemporary American poetry. He is a retired Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Georgia, where he taught for 30 years. His work was featured in "Love's Confusing Joy," an hour-long program with Bill Moyers filmed at the 1994 Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival and included in the 1995 PBS special "The Language of Life."