Poet & Creative Writing Instructor

I was born and raised in the green state of Vermont and lived there for twenty-seven years. Vermont runs deep in my blood and the smell of the earth in the Northeast Kingdom remains one of my most poignant memories. I then moved with husband and three children to Point Claire, Quebec where I lived for five years. This is the place where I truly found my voice and started college at John Abbott where I received my first poetry publications. We then moved to Grass Valley CA where I discovered one could be a mother and artist too.

When I first moved to Lassen County, a rural area, I started a writers’ workshop, The Thompson Peak Writers’ Workshop, which has been going for thirty years, and this has saved my skin since I live in a very remote area. We honor National Poetry Month and do several readings throughout the year. My husband and I, as well as our Samoyed Lily Lavender, live on six acres in a forest of oaks and ponderosa pines in Lassen County, CA. We have solitude and beauty here.

Besides being a mother of three, I am also a proud grandmother to seven most wonderful beings. My journey as a poet has not been easy since I had to learn how to tame my wild horses which has taken years. I have what’s called an “excessive-expressive.” I met with thousands of rejections at the early start of writing and have in the last several years had numerous acceptances in impressive magazines. I always found keeping enough work in circulation would help me when a particular rejection arrived and this has been enormously helpful. To me, poetry is all about “prayerful attention.” Writing has saved my life many times over.