With Wyoming in Mind: Wyoming Writes Its Own Narrative

This two-part project examines modern writing in Wyoming, from fictional narratives to poetry, as a framework for my own original poetry. By analyzing the primary source accounts left by writers, their own work, and peer reviewed investigations of their words, it seeks to determine what about Wyoming lends itself to a prominent, though often overlooked, literary tradition. The inherent paradox of creativity in the least-populated state suggests the cathartic and necessary nature of establishing a Wyoming narrative from within the state itself. Reinforcing this need for expression is the landscape, isolated and expansive, and the population, separate, even altern, from the rest of the United States. Such paradox, tied inextricably to these factors, have certainly influenced the collection of poems included in this project, which focus on my own experiences in relation to time and place, heroes, storms and weather, and religion.