Ava Leavell Haymon, Louisiana Poet Laureate for 2013-2015, is a poet, playwright, editor, and teacher. She has published widely, both in journals and in anthologies. Her latest collection, from LSU Press, is Eldest Daughter, a life’s work that grapples with her preacher’s daughter upbringing. She teaches poetry writing, directs workshops, reads her poems widely, and edits the Barataria Poetry Series for LSU Press. Her poems have been set to music and premiered by a number of classical and jazz composers, most recently recorded in a CD “Watercolors” by Robert Nelson. A recent collaboration is a commission by the Baton Rouge Symphony: creation of text for a multi-media symphonic piece focused on the Louisiana estuaries, with composer Christopher Theofanidis and photographer C.C. Lockwood.
She lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, with longsuffering husband, and, after much practice and a few lessons, plays the mandolin very badly.
Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ava_Leavell_Haymon
As a poet, I'm grateful that my medium is the contemporary American English language, ferociously evolving, energized as Elizabethan English was energized by new vocabulary and expanded usage. I'm grateful that poetry is a medium that slows us down, enables us to take in the rushing world in small bits and pieces, asks us to make sense of the chaotic present.
As a teacher of poetry writing to children, I believe this: Childhood is often a dangerous place. We survive it by learning to express ourselves in a way others can understand. I believe we owe our children the tools they need in order to begin this long task. As a teacher of poetry writing to youth and adults, I believe that life itself is often painful and baffling and that we need these same tools to find meaning, shared humanity, and joy. As both teacher and poet, I concur with Lee Fortier, jazz player and music educator: You gotta do it, and you gotta pass it on.
And as citizen and artist, I'm grateful to live and to write in the Gulf South, where sensory richness, cultural diversity, vibrant and numerous art forms, and wild weather all vie for a poet's attention and language.
Eldest Daughter
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The Strict Economy of Fire
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Why the Groundhog Fears Her Shadow
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Why the House Is Made of Gingerbread
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Laureates Online with Ava Leavell Haymon from 64 Parishes [2020]
She reads her poem “Self Portrait in Prismacolored Pencil with Sky”: https://fb.watch/57QhUPWQGx/
Country Roads Magazine, “Louisiana’s Poet Laureate” by Christie Matherne Hall.
My craft-tip in Diane Lockwood’s poetry newsletter, September 2014.
Washington Independent Review of Books features a great review of Eldest Daughter by Grace Cavalieri.
Swamp Lily features another fantastic review of Eldest Daughter by Leslie Schultz.
Dig features an Interview with Ava: “Pelican Poetry — Louisiana’s Poet Laureate on craft, publishing and rejection.”
Shreveport Times features an article about my visit: “Students get lesson from state poet laureate.”
My New Orleans chooses Ava as one of their “8 Louisianians of The Year.”
Poetry Magazine with “All Good Slides Are Slippery” a portfolio of poems, including one of Ava’s, collected by Daniel Handler (a.k.a. Lemony Snicket) and featuring illustrations by Chris Raschka.
The Advocate with a feature article on Ava’s work and appointment as Poet Laureate of Lousiana: “Louisiana is a wonderful place to write poetry…”
Cumberland River Review with the poem, “Aubade,” from Eldest Daughter.
Gris-Gris with the poem, “The Way We See It,” from Eldest Daughter.
Audio/Video Links
Interview of Ava by Barbara Varanka
Interview with Ava on WRKF “Poet Laureate Spreads the Word About Louisiana Poetry” by Ann Marie Awad (Visit WRKF.org for the original interview)—5 audio files linked below.
Listen to audio recordings from Ava’s new collection, Eldest Daughter.
Listen to Jim Engster's interview with Ava on the Jim Engster Show, NPR, 3 Sept, 2013.
Courtesy of the Knox Writer’s House, listen to Ava read “The First Wish” and other poems below. Also, available is Chancelier Xero Skidmore’s interview of Ava.
