Poet C.D. Wright joins a panel of poetry faculty from the University of Missouri— Kansas City for a discussion of her work and the art of writing poetry on Wednesday, March 11, at 7 p.m. at the Central Library, 14 W. 10th St.

The panel—Hadara Bar-Nadav, Michelle Boisseau, and Robert Stewart—will discuss with Wright the trajectory of a poet’s development, the collaborative nature of Wright’s work, the relationship between poetry and the political life of a country, and what Wright means when she suggests that “poetry/doesn’t/protect/you/anymore.”

Wright was born and raised in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas and has become one of America’s most compelling and idiosyncratic poets. She has authored a dozen collections of poetry and prose. Her most recent book Rising, Falling, Hovering prompted The New York Times to write “C.D. Wright belongs to a school of exactly one.” She has received fellowships from the MacArthur, Guggenheim, and Lannan Foundations, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She has won several awards, including the Lannan Literary Award and the Robert Creeley Award. The former Poet Laureate of Rhode Island, she is currently the Israel J. Kapstein Professor at Brown University.

Michelle Boisseau is the author of four books of poetry, most recently A Sunday in God-Years, and is the co-author of the popular text Writing Poems, now in its seventh edition.  Robert Stewart is Editor-in-Chief of New Letters, BkMk Press, and New Letters on the Air.  Hadara Bar-Nadav is the author of the poetry collection A Glass of Milk to Kiss Goodnight, winner of the 2005 MARGIE Book Prize.

The program is co-sponsored by the Cockefair Chair and UMKC’s Department of English.