The volatile compounds at the core of Lauren Camp s second book are poems of the coiled environment and tremendous loss. Here, the pious sober day solemnly descends / on undamaged desert. The poet claims every frayed moment, every taut mystery, and delivers these with sound-sense wisdom. Only an artist could show human frailty in this way. The thin line between right and otherwise is a fuse that ignites the author, who finds lyricism in mourning and erotic meaning in music. As she writes, perhaps wryly, perhaps optimistically, either we re standing in disordered light before the disappointment, or it s after. The Dailiness offers precision paired with undeviating attention to all the human senses.
Writer and educator Lauren Camp works in the confluence of sound, psychology and language.
New Mexico Poet Laureate Lauren Camp is the author of seven poetry collections, most recently An Eye in Each Square (River River Books, 2023) and Worn Smooth Between Devourings (NYQ Books, 2023).
She was awarded a 2023 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship. Other honors include a Dorset Prize and finalist citations for the Arab American Book Award, the Housatonic Book Award and the Adrienne Rich Award for Poetry. In 2022, she was Astronomer in Residence at Grand Canyon National Park. Lauren is the recipient of fellowships from Denver Botanic Gardens, The Taft-Nicholson Center for Environmental Humanities and Black Earth Institute. She was a visiting writer at the Mayo Clinic, and artist in residence at Lowell Observatory and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
Her poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies, including Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Mid-American Review, Missouri Review, and The Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day.
Her work has been translated into Turkish, Mandarin, Serbian, Arabic, French and Spanish. She teaches for Poetry Out Loud-New Mexico and leads her own community workshops.
She has pivoted from a successful career as a visual artist (1996-2008). Her portrait series, “The Fabric of Jazz,” traveled to museums in ten cities. More artwork can be found in cultural centers, hospitals, museums, U.S. embassies and other organizations around the world. For 15 years, she was a producer and host for Santa Fe Public Radio.
