Maureen Dunphy and Alison Swan at Literati

Join Maureen Dunphy & Alison Swan for a joint reading and conversation of their recent titles from Wayne State University Press. Please note: masks are required at Literati Bookstore events. About Divining: In sixteen essays, each named after a species of tree, Maureen Dunphy explores the nature of human-arboreal relationships, and how each of these trees has-literally-served as a friend, a confidante, or a place to rest. The depth and diversity of these relationships are revealed through essays that are both intimate and universal, moving and informative. While Dunphy's relationships with trees are unique and personal, her work reveals the deep-rooted complexity that connects all of humanity to our staunch, upright companions in life, the members of the "Standing Nation." Beyond providing oxygen, food, and shelter, trees can be sites of emotional refuge, sources of intellectual enrichment, and a boon to physical, mental, and spiritual health. Maureen Dunphy is the author of Great Lakes Island Escapes (Wayne State University Press, 2016), which received the 2017 Michigan Notable Book Award, and All About the Great Lakes. She leads writing workshops privately and for Springfed Arts and, through Dunphy Consulting Services, coaches writers and provides professional editing. Dunphy lives in the Detroit metropolitan area. About A Fine Canopy: Alison Swan's collection of poems, A Fine Canopy, illustrates how the natural world envelops and encloses us with so many beautiful things: crowns of leaves, the ubiquitous blue sky, our luminous moon, and snow. So much snow. An ecopoet whose writing shows her advocacy for natural resources, in this collection Swan calls the reader to witness, appreciate, and sustain this world before it becomes too late. Born in the Great Lakes basin, Alison Swan is a Mesa Refuge alum and a Petoskey Prize for Grassroots Environmental Leadership co-winner. Her poems and environmental writing have appeared in two chapbooks and in many anthologies and journals. She teaches at Western Michigan University and lives in the Huron and Kalamazoo River watersheds. Her Great Lakes collection, Fresh Water, was named a Michigan Notable Book