Elevating the Ordinary

Robert Morgan is one of America's finest younger poets. Often referred to as a regional poet, his work recounts the beauty and the way of life he knew in the mountains of North Carolina. Morgan has published eleven books of poetry and has received numerous awards, among them a Guggenheim fellowship, a fellowship at the Bellagio Conference in Italy, and the North Carolina Literary Award. Since 1971, he has taught at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. Vastness of the Near The littlest things recede great distances close up, the mite too fine to see, the bacterium and threshing molecule, globe of perfume floating, bright planet and carnival of many-colored mists miles and light-years away just in front of the eye in mute improvisations and showing us again remoteness of the least.