Penny Harter

I am a poet and fiction writer. I graduated from Douglass College and for many years taught high school English at public and private schools in New Jersey and New Mexico. I also visited schools all over New Jersey as a writer-in-residence, working as a teaching artist for the New Jersey Writers Project, conducting workshops in schools around the state. I helped launch New Jersey high schools' participation in "Poetry Out Loud," a program co-sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation.

My more recent books of poems include: *Still-Water Days* and *A Prayer the Body Makes,* (Kelsay Books / Aldrich Press 2021; 2020); *The Resonance Around Us,* (Mountains and Rivers Press, 2013); *One Bowl,* a prize-winning collection of haibun, (Snapshot Press,England, 2012); *Recycling Starlight,* a collection of poems moving through grief after the loss of my husband William J.[Bill] Higginson, in 2008 (Mountains and Rivers Press, 2010); *The Night Marsh (Word Tech Editions, 2008)*.

Earlier collections, some o/p, include *Lizard Light: Poems From the Earth* (Sherman Asher Publishing, Santa Fe); *Turtle Blessing* and *Buried in the Sky* (both from La Alameda Press, Santa Fe); *Stages and Views* (Katydid Books, Santa Fe); *Grandmother's Milk*, *Lovepoems*, *Hiking the Crevasse: Poems on the Way to Divorce*,*White Flowers in the Snow*, *The Price of Admission*, *House by the Sea*, and several collections of haiku and related genres. And for children,*The Beastie Book* (an alphabet book of rhyming poems about imaginary creatures. Shenanigan Books, 2010.)

Along with my late husband William J. Higginson, I was co-author of *The Haiku Handbook* (Kodansha America), and with him was a co-editor of From Here Press for many years. I am also the author of several chapbooks, including collections of haiku. Numerous anthologies and journals worldwide have published my work, including X. J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia's *An Introduction to Poetry* (various publishers, 1990 onward); *The Unswept Path* (White Pine Press, 2005); *The Book of Donuts* (Terrapin Books 2017); *Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems* (Grayson Books, 2017); *Healing the Divide: Poems of Kindness & Connection* (Green Writers Press, 2019) ​and others. And recent poems have appeared in such journals as The Naugatuk River Review, Persimmon Tree, Rattle, Tiferet, and on Ted Kooser's *American Life in Poetry*.

I have presented readings, talks, and workshops from coast to coast at venues such as the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festivals--most recently the 2010 Festival where I was a featured poet; the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum; Border Book Festivals; Haiku North America Conferences; the Rocky Mountain Land Library; the Colorado Mountain Club; the Sierra Club; New Jersey Teen Arts Festivals; the New Jersey Reading Association; the New Jersey Association of Independent Schools; and at events in Japan.

My essays on teaching writing appear in *The Alphabet of the Trees: A Guide to Nature Writing*; *The Teachers and Writers Guide to William Carlos Williams*; and *The Teachers and Writers Guide to Classic American Literature* (all published by Teachers & Writers Collaborative), and in *An Exaltation of Forms: Contemporary Poets Celebrate the Diversity of Their Art*, (U. of Michigan, 2002). Poems of mine are also included in several craft books, including *The Practicing Poet:Writing Beyond the Basics* (Terrapin Book, 2018), *The Crafty Poet II: A Portable Workshop* (Terrapin Books, 2016),*The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop* (rev.edition, Terrapin Books, 2016), and in the forthcoming *The Strategic Poet (Terrapin Books), as well as in *Wingbeats: Exercises and Practices in Poetry* (Dos Gatos Press, 2013).

In addition to the poems in my illustrated books for young readers, like the above-mentioned *The Beastie Book*, others of my poems for young people appear in my collection *Shadow Play: Night Haiku* (Simon & Schuster, 1994); and in *I Feel a Little Jumpy Around You* (Simon & Schuster, 1996); *Welcome to Your Life: Writings for the Heart of Young America* (Milkweed Editions, 1998); *Knock at a Star: A Child's Introduction to Poetry* (Little Brown, 1999); *Stone Bench in an Empty Park* (Orchard Books, 2000); *A Kick in the Head: An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms* (Candlewick Press, 2005), and *Hey You: Poems of Address* (Harper Collins, 2006).

I have received three fellowships in poetry from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and a fellowship in teaching writing from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation. I also received the Mary Carolyn Davies Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, and was named the first recipient of the William O. Douglas Nature Writing Award for my poems in *American Nature Writing* 2002.

My extended autobiographical essay appears both in *Contemporary Authors Autobiography Series (vol. 28, 1998)* and in *Contemporary Authors* (vol. 172, 1999)*. My biography also appears in several Who's-Whos related to teaching and writing, and in Marquis' *Who's Who of American Women*.

I enjoyed two residencies at Virginia Center for the Creative Arts---two weeks there in January 2011 and a three-week fellowship in spring, 2015.

For more information, comments on my various books and sample poems from each featured there, please visit my web site at pennyharterpoet.com. And from there you can link to my blog and earlier website. Thanks for stopping by.