L.S. Asekoff
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L.S. Asekoff | |
|---|---|
| Born | December 17, 1939 Waltham, Massachusetts, United States |
| Occupation | Poet, Professor |
| Period | Contemporary |
| Notable works | The Gate of Horn, The Widows of Gravesend |
| Notable awards | Guggenheim Fellowship, Witter Bynner, National Endowment for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, Fund for Poetry, Jerome Shestack Prize |
| Partner | Mary Louise Kalin |
Louis S. Asekoff (born December 17, 1939) is an American poet and professor emeritus. Asekoff often incorporates surrealist imagery and monologue[1] into his poetry, which is concerned with both the imagistic and aural dimensions of language. Asekoff's unconventional use of monologue as a poetic instrument is suggestive of "the inability of words to properly convey meaning" and a vehicle for implicating the readers who become "members of his poetic universe."[2] In 2012, Poet laureate Philip Levine, who selected Asekoff for the Witter Bynner Poetry Prize, described Asekoff as "a true surreal visionary."[3]
Asekoff taught poetry and coordinated the MFA Poetry Program at Brooklyn College for 42 years, where he also served as a Faculty Associate for The Wolfe Institute for Humanities.[4][5]
Derek Mahon’s poem “The Snow Party” was dedicated to Asekoff.
Asekoff was born in Waltham, Massachusetts, a small industrial city near Boston. The son of a psychiatrist, he grew up on the grounds of the psychiatric hospitals Danvers State and Metropolitan State Hospital.[4]
Selected publications
Books
- Dreams of a Work (1994, Orchises Press)
- North Star (1997, Orchises Press)
- The Gate of Horn (2010, Triquarterly)
- Freedom Hill: a poem (2011, Triquarterly).
