Hello Everyone!

I reside in Rocky River, Ohio with my husband and three children. I am a middle school language arts teacher and gifted intervention specialist. I get to teach all the nerdy kids who love talking about Dr. Who and Harry Potter. It is a dream job because my students are the best. They are curious and humorous. They love to learn.  They love to read and they often love to write. Everyday I get to share what I’m passionate about writing and reading with students who also share those sames passions.  When I’m not teaching and being a mom, I’m burning the midnight oil writing. I write YA fiction and my current WIP is a verse novel.

I’ve  never entered a contest like this before and I’m a bit nervous.  I don’t have any formal poetry training but as an English teacher I have always enjoyed reading and sharing poetry with my students on our scheduled Poetry Fridays.  I keep a poetry journal and find myself writing about events in my life. Lately these events have been emotional as my mother recently passed and my oldest daughter is leaving for college soon. I hope this challenge will open my awareness to other topics and encourage me to take some chances with my writing, possibly explore odd relationships between objects and situations. I’ve noticed that all of my poetry tends to be stylistically very similar, and since I’ve been writing in verse prose that seems to be my go to. I am going to pull out my poetry books and experiment with different styles. Listen to a lot of music for inspiration and drink lots of coffee.