POETRY MONDAY
 

 
Judith Hemschemeyer
 

Although best-known as the pre-eminent translator of  the great Russian poet, Anna Akhmatova, Judith Hemschemeyer had achieved recognition as a poet long before that. She has published four poetry collections: I Remember the Room Was Filled with Light (Wesleyan University Press, 1973); Very Close and Very Slow (Wesleyan University Press, 1975); The Ride Home (Texas Tech University Press, 1987); and Certain Animals  (Snake Nation Press, 1998).  A book of her short-stories, The Harvest, was published by Pig Iron Press in 1998.
 
It was in 1973 that she first encountered the poems of Akhmatova, becoming so enchanted by them that she studied Russian in order to translate them into English, a project that took thirteen years.  Her Complete Poems of Anna Akhmatova, a two-volume, bilingual, hard-cover edition, was published in 1990 by Zephyr Press, followed by three English-only paperback editions and a selected bilingual edition.
 
With this awe-inspiring achievement behind her, she continues to teach Creative Writing and Literature at the University of  Central Florida and to provide readers with new poems.  It gives me much pleasure to introduce Judith Hemschemeyer to you today with these three.  The first, “Or Just Miss,” is from her new, unpublished manuscript. The other two are from her award-winning books.
 
                                                     –Irene Willis, Poetry Editor
 
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