Poet Nancy Madison Fitzgerald will read from her newly published book of collected poems, "Take a Twig," Friday at Academy Village.
The 4 p.m. reading, with an introduction by poet Connie Wanek, will take place in the Arizona Senior Academy Building at Academy Village, 13715 E. Langtry Lane. A book signing will follow the reading.
Fitzgerald, an Academy Village resident, has taught literature and creative writing for 40 years, the last 20 at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minn. There she won the Lavine Award for teaching excellence.
Her poetry has appeared in publications such as the Atlanta Review, Christian Science Monitor, The Dunes Review and The Cancer Poetry Project. Her poems have been read by Garrison Keillor on "The Writer's Almanac."
Wanek, a well-known Minnesota poet, says of Fitzgerald's work, "Her poems take us everywhere with them: to weddings, to the bedside of the dying, to Crete, to the food bank in Tucson. Within the poems we discover 'sure signs/of struggle and of flight,' and deep engagement with the whole of life."
People are also reading…
Her poems inspire, help the reader to view relationships, feel the pain of loss and survival, and notice beauty in ordinary things.
The book title, "Take a Twig," comes from a myth regarding a sacred myrtle tree in Crete where Fitzgerald visited. She was told to take a twig from the tree, and it would provide protection for her.
Fitzgerald, a mother, stepmother and grandmother, says her first impulse to publish this fourth collection of her work was to gather her poems together for her grandchildren. One of the first poems in the book is titled "All of What I Want My Grandchildren to Know My Poems Attempt."
Academy Village is an active-adult community located off Old Spanish Trail six miles southeast of Saguaro National Park East.
If you go
• What: "Where Do Poems Come From?" lecture, poetry reading and book signing by Nancy Madison Fitzgerald.
• When: 4 p.m. Friday
• Where: Arizona Senior Academy Building at Academy Village, 13715 E. Langtry Lane
• Admission: Free; donations accepted
• Reservations: Recommended; email info@arizonasenioracademy.org or call 647-0980
To contribute a story go to azstarnet.com/east online.
