Fragment Friday - The Fellowship Edition

"Turn your face to the sun and the shadows follow behind you."
Maori Proverb

  
I bet you were thinking this post is going to be about Hobbits and Elves and all things Tolkien. Not this time, although those are subjects I can certainly expound upon. Nope, this post is all about the
Wyoming Arts Council Creative Writing Fellowship in Poetry. I am one of this year's recipients, along with Kathleen Smith and Carol Deering. I am thrilled to be a recipient, and am actively looking for conferences or workshops to attend next year. Have any suggestions? Let me know in comments.

Here is the announcement from the Wyoming Arts Council:

The Wyoming Arts Council is pleased to announce the recipients of this year’s creative writing fellowships in poetry. They are Constance Brewer and Kathleen Smith of Gillette and Carol Deering of Riverton.

They each will receive a $3,000 award plus a $500 stipend to travel to Casper to read their work on Saturday, Sept. 26, at the Casper College Literary Conference in Casper. They will read with California poet Rebecca Foust, who served as judge for this year’s fellowships.

Fellowship honorable mentions go to Cara Rodriguez of Casper and Leah Schlachter of Jackson.

Constance Brewer’s poetry has appeared in Dark Matter Literary Journal, The Linnet’s Wings, Nassau Review, American Tanka, the Wyoming Fence Lines Anthology from the Wyoming Arts Council and in the New Poets of the American West anthology, among other places. She is an editor for Gyroscope Review magazine. When not writing, Brewer spends time with “a small but vocal herd of Welsh Corgis.”

Kathleen Smith is a member of WyoPoets and Bear Lodge Writers and a past board member of Wyoming Writers, Inc. She says this about her writing life: “Living close to nature encourages the inspiration to record a way of life on my Wyoming ranch. I love where I live. Wide-open spaces shape my point of view as do the spring rains that feed fragile soils and winter snows that protect the hibernating earth. As a woman, I stand in the West while leaving footprints and legacy for future generations.”

Carol Deering received a Wyoming Arts Council poetry fellowship in 1999. She has received a writing residency at Devils Tower, through a National Park Service residency competition juried by Bear Lodge Writers. Her chapbook, To Taste the Wind, was a 2011 finalist with Flying Trout Press. Her poems have recently appeared in Prairie Wolf Press Review, The Provo Canyon Review, I-70 Review, and the WyoPoets chapbook, Weather Watch: Poems from Wyoming. She also has poems in Ring of Fire: Writers of the Yellowstone Region, edited by Bill Hoagland, from Rocky Mountain Press. In June 2015, Carol won first place in the Wyoming Writers, Inc., contest in the free-verse category.

This is the 30th year for the creative writing fellowships sponsored by the Wyoming Arts Council. Next year’s category will be creative nonfiction. Applications will be available online in spring 2016.

The Corgis were happy for me, too.  Here is Merlin, looking mighty pleased.

"Congratulations, Mom. Now throw the ball."

Max - "Kibble for everyone!"