Interviews

Getting to Know Linda Flaherty Haltmaier

Getting to Know Linda Flaherty Haltmaier

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? My first encounter was listening to my father recite poetry on long car rides. “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” was a favorite: All in a hot and copper sky/the bloody sun at...

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Getting To Know Dianne Silvestri

Getting To Know Dianne Silvestri

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? In second grade I was thrilled to have my first poem displayed on the bulletin board. The following year I authored a much longer rhyming piece, which I can still recite! The...

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Getting to Know Jack Giaour

Getting to Know Jack Giaour

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? I’ve been an avid (and advanced) reader since I was in 1st grade, but I think I truly discovered poetry through music. All the way into college I wanted to be a musician, but...

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Getting to Know Robbie Gamble

Getting to Know Robbie Gamble

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? I heard Anne Sexton read when I was fourteen (my aunt and uncle were friends of hers), and I was stunned by the power of her presence and her words. I also had a wonderful high...

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Getting to Know Hannah Siciliano

Getting to Know Hannah Siciliano

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? As a child I first encountered poetry when I was given a Shel Silverstein book. Later in grade school I can remember an assignment of taking text from Macbeth and creating a...

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Getting to Know Tatiana Johnson-Boria

Getting to Know Tatiana Johnson-Boria

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? I know I must have encountered poetry earlier than high school but the moment that sticks with me the most was in a high school AP English Language & Composition class. Our...

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Getting to Know Janet Aalfs

Getting to Know Janet Aalfs

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems?I found poetry everywhere in the remote mountains of southern West Virginia where I spent the firstpart of my childhood. I remember teaching myself how to write a 4 in the dirt...

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Getting to Know Leticia Priebe Rocha

Getting to Know Leticia Priebe Rocha

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? It is no exaggeration when I say that poetry has been a lifeline for me. I started writing poetry when I was in high school. As a teenager, I struggled with severe untreated...

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Getting to Know Elizabeth Sylvia

Getting to Know Elizabeth Sylvia

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? Like any good Doc Martens wearing teenage proto-goth of the early ‘90s, I loved Sylvia Plath, along with Yeats. It’s hard to believe now, but that was as close to contemporary...

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Getting to Know Paola Authievre

Getting to Know Paola Authievre

Authievre answered our questions in English and Spanish. Enjoy her responses. Authievre contestó nuestras preguntas en inglés y español. ¡Disfruta sus respuestas! When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? Before I knew I...

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Getting to Know Frances Donovan

Getting to Know Frances Donovan

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems?I was drawn to repetition in sounds and language from an early age – my earliest memories are of the Madeline books (“She even said ‘poo-poo’ to the lion in the zoo”) and the...

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Getting to Know Matthew E. Henry

Getting to Know Matthew E. Henry

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? Like most kids, I was exposed to and asked to write poetry in elementary school. In middle school and high school we were forced to analyze the genre. For most of that time, I...

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Getting to Know Mary Buchinger, Author of Virology

Getting to Know Mary Buchinger, Author of Virology

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? My mother learned many poems by heart and still, at age 92, can recite poetry she learned when she was a child. I am only now realizing how much poetry was a part of my childhood...

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Getting to Know Erica Charis-Molling, Author of How We Burn

Getting to Know Erica Charis-Molling, Author of How We Burn

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? I first discovered poetry in middle school. I was drawn to the delightful strangeness of e.e.cummings’ language, the quirky sage voice of Emily Dickenson, and the vivid, dramatic...

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Getting to Know Michael Ansara, Author of What Remains

Getting to Know Michael Ansara, Author of What Remains

When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems?  I fell in love with poetry in high school but as a reader, not a writer. Over the years I would read poetry, primarily what I think of as the “classics” for well-educated...

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