Whether he writes about a childhood picture of his wife, a Degas pastel drawing of ballerina dancers or his view of the moon through the lens of an old telescope, Michael Collier is a poet who writes from close observation.
The Department of English welcomes Collier to the College as part of its Prose/Poetry Reading Series. He will give a poetry reading today at 4:00 pm in the Wren Room, Sanborn Library.
An English professor at the University of Maryland and director of the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference held annually at Middlebury College, his three volumes of poetry include "The Clasp" (1986), "The Folded Heart" (1989) and "The Neighbor (1995)."
The subjects of his poems range from mortality and unrequited love, to memories of teenage jam. "The Fight" offers a violent and numerous descriptions of a frenzied, drink-throwing argument between two lovers. In "Frohlichkeit" he infuses compassion in his description of sado-masochist struggle between a man and a woman.
His latest work, "The Neighbor," a compilation of 26 poems, extrapolates on the theme of childhood memory.
Collier's realistic, clear-minded language has earned him numerous awards and recognitions and his poems have been published in such well-known periodicals as "The Atlantic," "The New Yorker" and "The New Republic."
In 1988 Collier received the Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award from the Poetry Society of America and has been designated as a Theodore Morrison Fellow in Poetry by the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.
In 1984 and 1994 he earned fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.
A reception will follow Collier's reading.
