Elizabeth Anne Jones

Poems Are How We See Elizabeth Anne Jones

The elegance of Elizabeth Anne Jones' poems can be found in such lines as: "One feels beauty, and knows/ when one is near a rose--/ but wind moves petals/ and tugs at leaves in a trembling tree./ It moves me." Or in her poem about old goats: "their small hooves tapping/ spritely songs of clippy-clapping." There are many voices in her poetry like the village women of Punjab who "sit/ kerchiefs of faded scraps/ tied across their lower faces/ to ward off evil germs--" And finally, in her poem, "The Dark," she writes: "A lute sings softly/ where I live/ a table, some fruit, a chair." She invites us into her poems. "Please come inside." Her poems have been published in various periodicals, books of poetry, and orally on audio CD's. They have also won many prizes. She became a serious poet in 1978 while she was working on her Masters Degree in poetry, at the University of Hawaii, where she studied under such well-known poets as James Wright who won a Pulitzer Prize for his Collected Works, and John Logan. She felt privileged to have had a course in research with Leon Edel, whose biography of Henry James won him a Pulitzer Prize. (He told us that if we ever published a book, to mention him, because it would give the book more clout.) Then, there was Elizabeth McCutcheon, a gifted teacher, whose courses in early 17th century poetry were inspired, and inspiring. We never got done reading her handouts. It was a wonderful climate for poets. And as a gardener, Anne would say that the potting soil was of the highest order.