Background

U.P. Poet Laureate Beverly Matherne is professor emerita of English at Northern Michigan University, where she directed the Master of Fine Arts Program and served as poetry editor of Passages North literary magazine.

Born in River Cajun Country just west of New Orleans, she grew up surrounded by a rich storytelling tradition in English and French. She was also blessed by the music of the area: Cajun, country western, blues, and jazz. From writing in French to performing blues poetry, these influences have shaped her work.

Beverly has also published poems and stories set in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and who can blame her? Is it possible to live in this lush paradise in summer and snow-capped wonderland in winter without being inspired?

She is the author of seven bilingual books of poetry; her latest, Potions d’amour, thés, incantations / Love Potions, Teas, Incantations, from Harvard Square Press, was launched at the Great Lakes Poetry Festival in 2023. Inspired by paintings, the collection is, according to Matthew Frank, “a brilliant collision of poetry, lyric essay, dramatic monologue, and ‘re-legending.’” Beverly’s “explorations of myths and legends are,” according to Cindy Hunter Morgan, “darkly luminous. Read them. Step into the bayou, and stumble out shaken…”

Beverly has published widely in journals and reviews such as Great River Review, Metamorphoses, Plat Valley Review, Runes, Spillway, Western Humanities Review, and Verse as well as a host of Francophone publications, including Ancrages, Éloizes, Feux chalins, Feux follets, Language et Créativité, and Résonance.

Her latest anthology publications include World Poetry Anthology, consisting of 229 poets from 59 countries, from Darklight Publishing, 2023, and Yooper Poetry: On Experiencing Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, from Modern History Press, 2024.

Beverly has won seven first-place prizes in poetry, including the Hackney Literary Award, and has received four Pushcart Prize nominations. She has done over 350 readings and performances across the United States, Canada, and France, and in Belgium, Germany, Spain, and Wales.

Venues where she has appeared include Shakespeare and Company in Paris, where she performed her blues poetry, and the Dag Hammarskjold Auditorium at the United Nations in New York, where she read with Stanley Kunitz, Gerald Stern, Maria Mazziotti Gillan, and others at the “International Poets and Writers Literary Arts Millennial Event: American Poets Greet Polish Poets at the UN.”

Currently, Beverly is completing her eighth book of poetry and restoring her Queen Anne Victorian home, the historic Butler House, in Ishpeming, Michigan.