Alison Touster-Reed’s poetry has appeared in journals in the
United States, Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom, including
such publications as The Threepenny Review, The Midwest Quarterly,
Carolina Quarterly, Poetry Wales, Kansas Quarterly, Forum, Pivot,
The Journal, PN Review, Poetry Australia, Oxford Magazine, Iron,
Queen’s Quarterly, The Antigonish Review, Prism International,
University of Windsor Review, Rosebud, Atlantis, Colorado State
Review, The Fiddlehead, Soundings East, and Dalhousie Review.
In the 70’s she published 2 books of poetry. Alison has won the
Merrill Moore Award for Literary Promise, an Academy of American
Poets’ Prize, and the Indiana University Foundation Prize in Poetry.
She has read her work at Indiana University, Aquinas College, Antioch
College, The Tennesseee Literary Arts Festival, and the annual meeting
of the South Central Modern Language Association. Alison was a founding editor of Cumberland Poetry Review, an internationally known journal of poetry that
published for over 20 years. She was the first
person to earn a doctorate in original poetry at Vanderbilt University. In
2008 Alison was a finalist in the John Ciardi Prize in Poetry from BkMk
Press. Her recent publications include Dalhousie Review, River Oak Review,
Pinch Journal, Pinyon, Journal of Poetry Therapy, Confrontation and New
Orleans Review. She has done her sculpture in a variety of media, including
wax, wood, plaster, metal and clay. In addition, she has many books of her "blind"
drawings and has created paintings in leather. Alison has exhibitions in Centennial
Park, Centennial Art Center, Renaissance Center, Arts in the Park, and TACA, and her
work can be seen at Midtown Gallery. Her sculpture entitled self-portrait won first prize at Nashville
Watkins College of Art and Design.
