Poetry Path: Patricia Spears Jones
Patricia Spears Jones was born in Forrest City, Arkansas and has lived for more than four decades in New York City. She is the author of A Lucent Fire: New and Selected Poems (White Pine Press, 2015). Her honors include grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts, awards from the New York Community Trust and the Foundation for Contemporary Art, and residencies from Bread Loaf, the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Yaddo, the Millay Colony, The Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, and The Bau Institute at Camargo Foundation. She was a finalist for the William Carlos Williams Prize and the Paterson Prize and the recipient of The Jackson Poetry Prize.
Patricia Spears Jones, excerpt from “Life Lessons” from A Lucent Fire. Copyright © 2015 by Patricia Spears Jones. Reprinted with the permission of the author and The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of White Pine Press.
The Poetry Path is made possible through a partnership with Battery Park City Authority, partners in design and fabrication of the Poetry Path, with additional support from our Outreach Partner, Goldman Sachs. Special thanks to the Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Foundation for funding the Poetry Path planning process, and to the Marcia Brady Tucker Foundation for supporting Poetry Path educational initiatives for youth and children.