An Evening of Poetry with Meg Reynolds
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Phoenix Books Rutland is proud to present an evening with Vermont poet Meg Reynolds, in celebration of her prizewinning collection Condition.
About the book: Condition is a vivid account of early motherhood during the isolation and global intensity of the COVID pandemic. Reynolds witnesses the impossible transformations of her home, her child, and herself while reckoning with a past that overlays the act of parenting. The book is a record of an awe both astonishing and terrible in a rare language rich with metaphor and depth of insight. "To become a parent and to write this book, I had to use every tool and skill at my disposal and had to invent new ones at the moment they were needed. I drew, wrote, slept, ate, fed, found and refound a thousand toys and small items of clothing, brushed hair, had my hair torn out, largely alone. What no one witnessed, I witnessed for myself on the page." For Reynolds, motherhood is a strange landscape of ghosts, monsters, illness, longing, and surprise. It is a wilderness where she and her family must navigate under the strange constraints of the pandemic within the walls of their small apartment and the empty neighborhood. In the absence of others, parenting is an invention and the self is an ever-changing reality. Between the poems, poetry comics, hybrid illustration, and drawn collages, Condition is a powerful collection of work that attests to hard work of love and artmaking. It won the National Hillary Gravendyk Prize in 2024.
About the author: Meg Reynolds is a poet, artist, and teacher from New England. An instructor in writing and humanities at Vermont Adult Learning in Burlington, her work has been published in a number of literary journals including Mid-American Review, RHINO, The Offing, Iterant, Prairie Schooner, New England Review and the Kenyon Review. A graduate of the Stonecoast MFA program, her poetry and comic work has been three times nominated for the Pushcart Prize and once for Best the Net. Her first collection of poetry comics, A Comic Year, was published in October 2021 from Finishing Line Press. Her second collection, Does the Earth, was published in May 2023 from Harpoon Books. Reynolds' poetry was published in Best New Poets 2023. Reynolds was also the 2024 winner of Inlandia Institute's Hillary Gravendyk Prize with her collection, Condition, published in April 2026. You can read more of her work via her biweekly publications on her Substack, Condition and Other Conditions.
Date: Wednesday, September 16th at 6:30pm
Location: Phoenix Books at 2 Center Street in Rutland, VT
Tickets: This event is free and open to all.
Books: Signed copies of Condition will available at the event.
About the book: Condition is a vivid account of early motherhood during the isolation and global intensity of the COVID pandemic. Reynolds witnesses the impossible transformations of her home, her child, and herself while reckoning with a past that overlays the act of parenting. The book is a record of an awe both astonishing and terrible in a rare language rich with metaphor and depth of insight. "To become a parent and to write this book, I had to use every tool and skill at my disposal and had to invent new ones at the moment they were needed. I drew, wrote, slept, ate, fed, found and refound a thousand toys and small items of clothing, brushed hair, had my hair torn out, largely alone. What no one witnessed, I witnessed for myself on the page." For Reynolds, motherhood is a strange landscape of ghosts, monsters, illness, longing, and surprise. It is a wilderness where she and her family must navigate under the strange constraints of the pandemic within the walls of their small apartment and the empty neighborhood. In the absence of others, parenting is an invention and the self is an ever-changing reality. Between the poems, poetry comics, hybrid illustration, and drawn collages, Condition is a powerful collection of work that attests to hard work of love and artmaking. It won the National Hillary Gravendyk Prize in 2024.
About the author: Meg Reynolds is a poet, artist, and teacher from New England. An instructor in writing and humanities at Vermont Adult Learning in Burlington, her work has been published in a number of literary journals including Mid-American Review, RHINO, The Offing, Iterant, Prairie Schooner, New England Review and the Kenyon Review. A graduate of the Stonecoast MFA program, her poetry and comic work has been three times nominated for the Pushcart Prize and once for Best the Net. Her first collection of poetry comics, A Comic Year, was published in October 2021 from Finishing Line Press. Her second collection, Does the Earth, was published in May 2023 from Harpoon Books. Reynolds' poetry was published in Best New Poets 2023. Reynolds was also the 2024 winner of Inlandia Institute's Hillary Gravendyk Prize with her collection, Condition, published in April 2026. You can read more of her work via her biweekly publications on her Substack, Condition and Other Conditions.
Date: Wednesday, September 16th at 6:30pm
Location: Phoenix Books at 2 Center Street in Rutland, VT
Tickets: This event is free and open to all.
Books: Signed copies of Condition will available at the event.
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Where is it happening?
2 Center St, Rutland (city), VT, United States, Vermont 05701, 2 Center St, Rutland, VT 05701-4015, United States
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
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Host or PublisherPhoenix Books Rutland
