Searching for Jenny Moses

How does Judith W. Monroe's poetry differ from her contemporaries? Someone has said that her poems last, popping into your mind unbidden but always welcome, that her poetry does what the best poetry has always done, which is to find the universal in the particular. Her poems sing out from the pages of Searching for Jenny Moses. The narrative style fits the subjects she writes of, colorful and alive. The lyrics are bits of beauty she discovered and had to share. She invites, and in some cases, dares the reader to experience them all. Monroe has coined her work poetry verite, like a hand-held camera, whose pictures she develops and frames, each a gift offered to the reader. The reality of specific incidents no matter how small, often hits her as vital, even though a few can be distinctly uncomfortable. Some of these poems are unsparing in their recording of the grief in people's lives. Monroe's poetry is written beautifully, shining a light on the everyday. Together with her reader she celebrates with her words the extraordinary within the pedestrian. The essence of Judith Monroe's power lies in the journey she has take over a lifetime of searching for meaning. Monroe, who is eighty, has been writing for over fifty years, first for her three children, later for her grandchildren and for every age. She graduated from Simmons College with a degree in Library Science, studied piano at the New England Conservatory and later at Goddard College she earned a Master in group and interpersonal dynamics. She has written five other books; the first a text book on group dynamics for librarians. The second a novel, and the others, stories for children. She worked as a librarian for twenty -five years, starting a small food processing business after she retired. She has lived for over fifty years with her partner, Sandy Johnson, in Maine, currently in Hallowell, Maine, and summering on Swans Island