Kathleen Driskell discusses Goat-Footed Gods with Erin Keane

Carmichael's is excited to host Kathleen Driskell for her new poetry collection, Goat-Footed Gods. She will be joined in conversation by Erin Keane.

About the Book:

In her sixth collection Goat-Footed Gods, award-winning poet, essayist, and teacher Kathleen Driskell seeks to rehabilitate the reputation of the infamous Goatman of Pope Lick, identified by The Washington Post as one of the deadliest cryptids in America. The Goatman or Pope Lick Monster, a legendary creature long rumored to roam the woods around Driskell's Kentucky home, is alleged to have caused the deaths of at least five young people at Pope Lick Trestle, a railroad bridge with a ninety-foot drop at its center. The Goatman lyrics are braided with poems about Driskell’s child’s traumatic injury from a fall. Always at the heart of Driskell’s poetry is her insistence that the path to the sacred is found not through the doctrine of ancient gods, but in walking clear-eyed through the dark woods of our historical past and exploring the never-ending wonder of the natural world.

About the Authors:

Kathleen Driskell is an award-winning poet, essayist, and teacher and author of six books of poetry, most recently Goat-Footed Gods from Carnegie Mellon University Press. Her poems and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in many nationally known literary publications, including The New Yorker, River Teeth, Appalachian Review, Shenandoah, Southern Review, Rattle and are featured online on Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, and American Life in Poetry. Her awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, an Al Smith Fellowship, the Denny C. Plattner Award, a Notable listing in Best American Essays 2020, and the Judy Gaines Young Book Award. Past chair of the board for the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (2019-22), Driskell is professor of creative writing and Chair of the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University, home of the nationally distinguished low-residency MFA in Writing Program.

Erin Keane is a critic, poet, essayist, and journalist. She’s the author of the memoir Runaway: Notes on the Myths That Made Me (Belt Publishing), one of NPR’s best books of 2022, and editor of The Louisville Anthology (Belt Publishing, 2020). She has also published three collections of poetry. Her writing has appeared in many publications, anthologies, and public radio programs, and she was co-producer and co-host of the limited audio series These Miracles Work: A Hold Steady Podcast. Her latest audio project is the Blair Water Literary Society, a podcast about (re)reading L.M. Montgomery’s Emily of New Moon, which you can subscribe to on your favorite podcast app. She is Chief Content Officer at Salon.com and teaches in the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University.

Host or Publisher Susan Norton