SUPLA PR Re Poet Laureate Academy of American Poets Award
SUPLA PR Re Poet Laureate Academy of American Poets Award
The Academy of American Poets announced today that it is awarding $50,000 each to its 2023 Poets Laureate Fellows for a combined total of $1.1 million. Sullivan County Poet Laureate Sharon Kennedy-Nolle is one of twenty-three individuals serving as poets laureate of states, counties, and cities across the United States to receive this honor. Sharon will receive funding for a multi-faceted project based on her experience with poetry and healing, to be undertaken between now and the spring of 2024.
Sharon Kennedy-Nolle’s project, “Catskilled Poetry for Healing,” will utilize poetry as a tool for healing and self-empowerment and will be targeted to residents, including youth, afflicted by mental illness and substance abuse. Supported by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and Catholic Charities, the project consists of a three-month period of outreach to their affiliates; a six-month series of poetry workshops; a daylong interdisciplinary symposium bridging poetry, mental health, and public policy, for which the Hurleyville Performing Arts Center is also a partner; and a permanent public arts installation featuring the workshop’s poetry mounted on plaques and installed in the county’s eleven public library locations.
The Sullivan County Poet Laureate Project, administered by the Sullivan Public Library Alliance – which is comprised of the 9 public libraries in Sullivan County - is thrilled that Kennedy-Nolle was selected for this prestigious award and that it will enable her to undertake the “Catskilled Poetry for Healing” project. Sharon is passionate about undertaking this vital work during her tenure as Sullivan County Poet Laureate.
Kennedy-Nolle is the author of Black Wick: Selected Elegies, the 2020 Chapbook Editor’s Pick by Variant Literature Press and a 2021 finalist for Black Lawrence Press’s St. Lawrence Book Award.
