Professor Writes About Country Dance Scene
University of St. Thomas Professor, Playwright and Poet Janet Lowery edited a collection of poetry about the country music dance scene titled, “By the Light of a Neon Moon: Poetry Out of Dancehalls, Honky Tonks, Music Halls and Clubs.”
Initially intended to help preserve in poetic form the tradition of country western swing dancing, most notably the two-step, the polka and its variant the “triple two,” and western waltz, the collection includes a handful of poems celebrating other dance forms and musical traditions.
Three Texas Laureates Work Featured
The anthology includes poems on the subject by three Texas poet Laureates – Alan Birkelbach, karla k. morton and Dave Parsons and the 2006-2008 Virginia Poet Laureate, Carolyn Kreiter-Foronda, as well as work by the editor and other notable poets.
Lowery has three poems included in the anthology. Her love of dancing spurred her interest in compiling this book.
The book is available from Madville Publishing of Dallas at https://madvillepublishing.com/ and Amazon.
Lowery's Oeuvre
Lowery joined the faculty of the University of St. Thomas in 1990. Her poetry has been published in literary reviews such as Poetry East, Greensboro Review, Concho River Review, Fideles, Pennsylvania English, 13th Moon, and in numerous anthologies such as Enchantment of the Ordinary (2019), Untameable City (2015) and Improbable Worlds (2011), all from Mutabilis Press. Other anthologies include Far Out: Poems of the 60s (Wings Press), Texas in Poetry 2 (TCU Press, 2002); the twentieth-year Poetry East anthology, Who Are the Rich and Where Do They Live? (DePaul, 2000); Texas in Poetry: A 150 Year Anthology (University of North Texas Press, 1994), and Women’s Blood (Continuing SAGA Press, 1981).
A chapbook of her poetry, Thin Dimes, was published by Wings Press in 1992 and reprinted in 1997. Odonata House published her collection of poetry based on women from Greek mythology called Traffic in Women in 2008; the trilogy of plays TRAFFIC IN WOMEN I, II, III was produced 2006-2008 on the UST campus. Mildred’s Umbrella Theatre Company produced her latest play, A Heroine-Free Summer, in Houston in 2017.
The University of St. Thomas is Houston’s Catholic University. For more than 70 years, UST has graduated students into successful careers in medicine, education, business, public administration and more. As Houston grows, UST will continue to provide the strong leaders and skilled workers needed to meet those demands.
