Lance Larsen
Filed under: Authors
Lance Larsen grew up in Idaho mowing lawns, delivering newspapers, and dreaming of catching Bigfoot on film. He has published six poetry collections, most recently Making a Kingdom of It (Tampa, 2024). His awards include a Pushcart Prize and first-place honors in contests sponsored by The Tampa Review, the Missouri Review, Sewanee Review, Swamp Pink, Southwest Writers, and The Moth (Ireland), as well as fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Ragdale, and the Anderson Center. In graduate school he served as poetry editor of Gulf Coast. He also writes fiction and nonfiction and has aspirations of one day writing a play. His essays have made the Notables List six times in Best American Essays.
As poet laureate of Utah (2012-2017), he made frequent visits to K-12 classrooms and university campuses and helped to promote Poetry Out Loud, a national recitation program for high school students. He also developed Poetry Central, a web page archiving writing prompts used by poets around the state. He teaches at BYU where he serves as poetry editor of Literature and Belief and fools around with aphorisms: "When climbing a new mountain, wear old shoes." Sometimes he juggles.
Winning Entry: I’m Done with Birds
Contest Won: Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest 2024, Honorable Mention, Tom Howard
