Marita Garin

MFA from Goodard College in Vermont, the program which has since moved to North Carolina and is now known as the Warren Wilson Writing Program. Worked with extraordinary teachers, Ellen Bryant Voigt, Michael Ryan, and Louise Gluck. Taught poetry for a variety of venues, working in small part-time jobs, and gave readings at a wide variety of places. Edited Southern Appalachian Poetry, An Anthology of Works by 37 Poets which grew out of lectures for an Elderhostel Program on "Appalachian Poetry and Culture" and which drew on the mnany years I lived in East Tennessee which is where I first began to write. More recently,I have done extensive work on dream interpretation for a group of friends here in Black Mountain, North Carolina, where I now live. During a hiatus in my writing; which lasted 15 years, I did volunteer work as a Guardian Ad Litem in Buncombe County, North Carolina, a program which provides representation for abused and neglected children in Juvenile Court. When I returned to writing poetry again, I found much had changed, not only in the focus of what I wanted to write about but also in the poetry landscape. I began work on a long poem three years ago. It has turned out to be a book of poems, recently completed. I have found the mountains in this part of the country to be inspiring. There is an unusual creative energy here which many artists and writers are drawn to. It takes us where it will.