Jesse Arthur Stone

I was born and raised in Southern California, where I earned a B.A. with Honors in English and American Literature from the University of California, San Diego and an M.A. in English and American Literature from Claremont Graduate University. I moved to Vermont, where I lived for 21 years and where I earned an M.F.A. in poetry fromVermont College of Fine Arts (VCFA). At VCFA, I studied with Roger Weingarten, Susan Mitchell, Elizabeth Spires, and Jack Myers. Also, I took workshops with Galway Kinnell, Hayden Carruth, and Diane Wakoski at the Vermont Studio Center. My poems arrive in a variety of guises, such as memory narrative, minimalist philosophical lyrics, whimsical and humorous takes on personal relationships, and rhetorical poems and rants that point to social and political issues. I often use humor, hyperbole, and different registers of diction and layers of information to achieve what the late Tony Hoagland described as "composite poems." I am committed to giving readings from my new book, Holy Cow: An Unbelievable Tale, and to teaching poetry workshops