Penn State Altoona professor publishes new book of poems

ALTOONA, Pa. - Erin Murphy, professor of English at Penn State Altoona, has published her latest book of poetry, "Fluent in Blue."

"Fluent in Blue," published by Grayson Books, was also named a finalist for Ohio University's Hollis Summers Poetry Prize, the Alice James Award sponsored by Alice James Books, and the Word Works Books Washington Prize.

From displaced bluegills to Picasso's Período Azul, "Fluent in Blue" examines blue in its many permutations: color, emotion, mental illness, nature, politics, and music. Poet Nicole Cooley says the book "asks what it means to be fluent-in a language, in a place and time, and in a body," adding that she loves "Murphy's elegiac gaze and the fierce way she demands our attention."

Poet Mihaela Moscaliuc describes the collection as "a rhapsody of uncompromising frankness and tenderness" and says Murphy is "a poet of consummate attentiveness, a storyteller assured in her craft."

Murphy is the author or editor of more than a dozen previous books, chapbooks, and anthologies, with two additional books forthcoming from Salmon Poetry and Wesleyan University Press. She is the Poet Laureate of Blair County and is currently serving as Penn State's inaugural Mellon Academic Leadership Fellow for the Big Ten Academic Alliance. You can read more about her work on her website.