Issue 83: Laura Van Prooyen

Prooyen

About Laura Van Prooyen

Jennifer Christman Laura Van Prooyen is author of two collections of poetry, Our House Was on Fire(Ashland Poetry Press 2015) nominated by Philip Levine and winner of the McGovern Prize and Inkblot and Altar (Pecan Grove Press 2006). Her poems also have appeared in APR, Boston Review, Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, and The Southern Review among others. Van Prooyen teaches in the low-residency MFA Creative Writing program at Miami University, and she lives in San Antonio, TX.

 

A Profile of the Author

Notes on “Bless The Feral Hog”

A few years ago, the Texas Dept. of Agriculture Commissioner, Sid Miller, tried to make it legal for people to poison feral hogs to try to control the population. The poison promised a slow, terrible, painful death for these sentient creatures. This great idea came after allowing people to shoot feral hogs from helicopters (true story) failed to control the population. Meanwhile, I recalled Galway Kinnell’s romanticized poem about St. Francis and the Sow, and I wondered where these two ideas might meet. You see where the poem ended up.

Music, Food, Booze, Tattoos, Kittens, etc.

I have three cats, and it’s probably wrong to play favorites, but my lap belongs to Pico. Full name Pico de Gato “Picoso” Clyne. His paw prints are all over my poems, literally. He’s a crooked-jaw wonder who looks like Snowball from the Simpsons:

“Bless the Feral Hog” by Laura Van Prooyen

Found in Willow Springs 83 Back to Author Profile . . . Saint Francis / put his hand on the creased forehead of the sow, and told her in words and … Read more

Read More

Leave a Comment