Award-winning poet Naomi Shihab Nye read a selection of poems and spoke about the writing process to students as last spring’s Bingham Visiting Writer. Ms. Nye’s books of poetry include 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East, a finalist for the National Book Award; A Maze Me: Poems for Girls; and You & Yours, a bestselling poetry book of 2006. She has written several prize-winning poetry anthologies for young readers, as well. Ms. Nye has held several fellowships, including Guggenheim, Lannan, and Witter Bynner. She has received several major awards, including four Pushcart Prizes and the Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature.
On writing poetry: “People often ask, ‘What can you do when you are utterly blank?’ The two things I tell them are eavesdrop and babysit. If you listen to other people talk, you will hear interesting language that isn’t like your own. If you spend time with little children, you will be refreshed by the majesty of their inquisitive metaphorical wonder.”