Gemini Ink Literary Arts Center presents a Witter Bynner Fellowship reading featuring Executive | Artistic Director Sheila Black, a recipient of the 2012 Witter Bynner Fellowship from the Library of Congress selected by recent Poet Laureate Philip Levine. Levine introduced Black, along with poet L.S. Asekoff, as the two 2012 recipients on April 5 at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Each received a $10,000 fellowship, provided by the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry. This is the 15th year the fellowships have been awarded. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said, “These fellowships—to poets whose distinctive talents and craftsmanship merit wider recognition—provide a wonderful way for the Laureate, the Library and the Witter Bynner Foundation to encourage poets and poetry.” Black is the author of two poetry collections: Love/Iraq (2009) and House of Bone (2007). Recently, Black co-edited, along with Jennifer Bartlett and Mike Northen, the anthology Beauty is a Verb: The New Poetry of Disability (2011). Her poems have appeared in Blackbird, Cutback, Diode, Puerto Del Sol and other journals. She is the recipient of the Frost-Pellicer Frontera Prize (2000) and resides in San Antonio. As part of her commitment to the Foundation, Black will share her work with the community through this special Witter Bynner Fellowship reading at Gemini Ink. Commenting on Black, Levine said “She is a consummate poet of memory who seems able to inhabit all the various women she is and has been. The loves and losses of the child, the young woman and the mother are present in these rich lyrics and storied poems. Hers is a poetry of feeling, and the whole panoply of emotions—from love to rage—is present and earned.” Gemini Ink is a non-profit literary arts center that nurtures readers and writers and builds community through literature and the related arts. For more information on the reading and other events and programs, visit www.geminiink.org or call 210.734.9673. For further information on Witter Bynner fellowships and the poetry program at the Library of Congress, visit www.loc.gov/poetry/.