Catching Up With Kelly Cressio-Moeller

Where can we read some of your recent work? 

My first poetry collection, “Shade of Blue Trees”, was the Finalist for the Wilder Prize at Two Sylvias Press and released this June: 

http://www.twosylviaspress.com/store/p71/Shade_of_Blue_Trees_%28Finalist_for_the_Wilder_Prize%29_Price_includes_shipping.html

Other recent poems can be found at West Trestle Review: https://www.westtrestlereview.com/west_trestle_cressio_moeller.html

Four Visual/Erasure Poems at The Indianapolis Review:  https://theindianapolisreview.com/kelly-cressio-moeller-four-visual-poems/

What are you reading right now? 

I’ve returned to readings several books at once. I read very little in 2020, finding it impossible to concentrate so I’m grateful for words again. Currently reading (not completed) 3 exquisite poetry collections and 1 novel: Where the Wolf by Sally Rosen Kindred, The Renunciations by Donika Kelly, Paddock by Mary Lou Buschi, and The Midnight Library by Matt Haig. All very different stylistically but the poetry collections, thus far, have several common threads running through each: grief and trauma of girlhood, its violence, violations, elegiac-tone—the body, its memory, thresholds…Rosen Kindred, Kelly, and Buschi are all incredible in their language (and Kelly’s erasures!) and imagery. The Haig novel is a gift from a good friend and it begins: “Nineteen years before she decided to die, Nora Seed sat in the warmth of the small library at Hazeldene School in the town of Bedford.” I have high hopes for this, too.

Next on the reading list: The House on Vesper Sands by Paraic O’Donnell, Come-Hither Honeycomb by Erin Belieu, The Age of Phillis by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

What’s next for you? 

For the moment, I am enjoying promoting my book via Zoom readings. You can see the schedule (updated often as links/information arrives) at my website. I’d love to “see” you there!

http://www.kellycressiomoeller.com/readings.html

Bio:

Kelly Cressio-Moeller is a poet and visual artist. Her poems have appeared widely in journals including Gargoyle, North American Review, Salamander, THRUSH, Water~Stone Review, and ZYZZYVA, among others. She is an associate editor at Glass Lyre Press. Shade of Blue Trees is her first poetry collection. www.kellycressiomoeller.com