Biography of Dan Liberthson
Poetry Prizes and Honorable Mentions (National Federation of State Poetry Societies Contests)
William Stafford Memorial Award, 2020, Second Place for “Reading James Wright”
Maine Poets Society Award, 2022, Second Place for “The Lighthouse”
Poetry Society of Texas Award, 2025, Second Place for “Will it Be the Last”
Barbara Stevens Memorial Award, 2025, First Honorable Mention for “A Real Live Nightmare”
Georgia Poetry Society Contest, 2022, First Honorable Mention for “Robert Gwathney’s “'Cotton Picker'”
Miriam S. Strauss Memorial Award, 2025, First Honorable Mention for “Cure for a Teen’s Broken Heart”
William Stafford Memorial Award, 2025, Second Honorable Mention for "A Lose-Lose Situation”
Jesse Stuart Memorial Award, 2025, Second Honorable Mention for “Bred in the Bone”
Selected Publications (individual poems and stories)
Black Buzzard Review
Chaminade Literary Review
Cirque #29 (an online journal)
Elysian Fields Quarterly
Encore 2020 and 2022 (prize-winning poems published by the National Federation of State Poetry Societies)
Graffiti (a Eugene, Oregon tabloid)
Language of Shadows (2021) and Passages (2022), anthologies of Lane County, Oregon authors, by the Cottage Grove Harpies writers group)
Miraloma Life (a community newsletter)
Passages (2022 Anthology of Lane County, Oregon authors, by the Cottage Grove Harpies)
Poeming Pigeon, Issue #14 (2024)
South Coast Poetry Journal
Spitball, The Literary Baseball Magazine
The Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal
The Neovictorian / Cochlea
Triggerfish (an online poetry and art journal)
Personal History
Born in Rochester, New York, I attended Reed College, Northwestern University (BA, history) and SUNY at Buffalo (PhD, English), and now split my time between San Francisco, CA and Cottage Grove, OR. After 3 years of teaching English at Kent State and Akron universities in Ohio, and a brief period doing the same for the US Navy's PACE program, I segued into a 3-decade career as a consulting technical and medical writer in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Like many writers, I find that the worlds I create and inhabit in my poetry and fiction are often more engrossing and intense than my "real" life. I have published six books of poetry for adults, five of which include photos or artwork, as I believe poetry is stronger in combination with visual images. A Carnival of Cats (2025), my latest collection, contains 63 poems and 12 watercolor paintings. The book is a poetic journey through the enchanting, complex world of cats—those captivating creatures who both comfort and confound their human companions. A Poetry of Birds (2017) includes 38 free-verse poems about various wild bird species. The poems are accompanied by full-color prints of the photographs that inspired them, taken by a professional wildlife and nature photographer. The poems in Animal Songs (2010), which explore the power of animals to inspire a fuller experience of life, are accompanied by professionally drawn drawings. The Pitch is On the Way: Poems About Baseball and Life (2008) explores the game and what it means to fans, and features striking line drawings. Garrison Keillor read the poem "Child's Play" from this book on his radio show "The Writer's Almanac" (Aug 30, 2012). A Family Album (2006) comprises poems about my childhood in, and growth out of, an American Jewish family with a mentally ill sister. Many of the poems are accompanied by old family photos and geometric constructions that express in visual form the emotional tone of the particular family figure or relationship. Morning and Begin Again is a large collection of poems that grapple with the struggles, strife, and occasional triumphs of life. One section of this thematically arranged book comprises elegies, memorial poems and celebrations of close friends ripped away by death; another describes my experiences battling and surmounting the depressions that have dogged me throughout my life; and yet another explores the loves and joys that helped lift me out of the dark places.
My espionage novel, The Bluejay Contrivance, is primarily set in the mid-1970s, but as a work of fiction rich in history it includes material from as far back as World War II and takes place in many locales throughout the world. I made this foray into a genre I had not previously explored because I enjoy challenging myself with projects of radically different types. My prior novel was a first for me as well: The Golden Spider, a middle-grade fantasy novel, draws on settings and themes from my experiences living in upstate New York and Ohio and stars a telepathic cat and a golden, spider-like alien who accompany a young boy on a cosmic journey. The cat, Cleopatra (“Cleo”), helps the hero defeat a malign cosmic dragon. It was perhaps Cleo’s covert suggestion that I compose my latest book of poems, entirely devoted to cats, ever a powerful and inspiring presence in my life.
Snippets
The cat crouches before the fire.
Startled sphinx, it scans the room.
Sharp green eyes possess all they see.
With ripped left ear and broken tail,
he soaked up heat beside the radiator,
at ease, purring himself to sleep …
A low rumble of thunder sounded in the distance. From far away came the thin, sad whistle of a passing train. Jeremy wondered what sort of people were on the train, and where they were going. You couldn't get to Egypt on a train. He wouldn't get to Egypt at all now that Gramps was gone.
* * *
The two-faced chess clock stared expectantly at Peter, but his indecisive hand froze achingly above the pin. Time was a wedge driven into his forehead. The black pieces gazed amusedly into his eyes, while his white men exposed their vulnerable backs to the enemy, cast their gazes down at the board, and refused to recognize him. Were they ashamed?