The Lake Library is a collection of Lake-facing literature that lives in the Making Waves Museum with all of our puppets and art. We have curated an online version of the Lake Library for you here ! This library includes local poetry, activist fiction, children’s storybooks, anarchist zines, and books that inspire folks in the movement space. If you want to visit the physical library, don’t hesitate to reach out. Check out some of our favorites below!
irreplaceable is a collective praise poem for Great Salt Lake, composed by Nan Seymour with a forward by Terry Tempest Williams. It was published by Moon in the Rye Press in 2024.
Over 400 voices sing their praises in this anthology: sixth graders, brine shrimpers, Indigenous elders, birders, queer/Trans artists, scientists, spellcasters, and activists, alongside scores of others who proclaim this lake as beloved. irreplaceable is read aloud every year as vigil keepers continue to praise the lake and all of the species she sustains.
The print edition of irreplaceable was made possible by Utah's Poet Laureate, Lisa Bickmore, and Moon in the Rye Press, her poet laureate project. A Poet Laureate Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets also supported this publication. Learn more about the press here: moonintheryepress.org.
when praise began to flow
we felt the genesis of our feathers
we felt water return to the sea
of ourselves, we felt
a swell in the lake
of ourselves. we felt
the surge of our rivers
we felt tidal. we felt primal. we fell
with the snow.
~ an excerpt from “the invocation” by nan seymour
Sarah May’s poetry chapbook, Our stories are our bodies, honors Great Salt Lake as a refuge for those seeking belonging. In these poems, the Lake sends dreams, gives gifts of bones and feathers, and breathes magic into spells.
Sarah May’s poetry reads like a crystal-clear day in between weeks of inversion, a stunning reminder that this place was, and is, sacred. Her poetry and artwork alike remind us what it means to deeply honor the more-than-human world.
You can also buy her book here: https://sarahlizmay.com/shop
bloodsalt is a tiny red book by Sav Pearson that was printed by lakewords in 2025. It follows a group of queer disabled activists who experiment with strange & mystical modes of direct action to defend the Lake. The story imagines a reality that is just a few salt crystals away from this one.
art by Adrian Fox-Staley
microbialite manifestos: revolutionary voices for great salt lake
This anthology uplifts the voices of youth activists, drag artists, spellworkers, doulas, anarchist poets, disabled oracles, whales, and other politicized members of our community who are calling for radical transformation in the way we relate to this place. They argue that saving the Lake requires reckoning with the ongoing impacts of settler colonialism and techno-fascism in this valley. Some of these manifestos are a scream into the void. Others are a tribute to the birds, brine shrimp, and other little guys who have probably been screaming all along. Following the incisive poetry of lake words, the direct actions of UYES, and the bold and brash tactics of Climate Defiance, the manifestos make space for grief, rage, and -yes!- intersectional politicized discourse.
