Ann Spiers

Ann Spiers lives on Vashon Island, Puget Sound, where she was the island’s inaugural poet laureate. Her diverse life provides the seeds for Rain Violent’s quatrains. She raised sons down trail in a beach cabin, leads writing workshops, assists with fieldwork in the Cascade volcanoes and for citizen science projects, and hiked the Washington coast from the Columbia River to Cape Flattery. Her poems appear widely in journals, anthologies, and online. In addition to Rain Violent, her other recent books include Back Cut (Black Heron) and Harpoon (Triplet Series, Ravenna). Her chapbooks include What Rain Does (Egress Studio), Bunker Trail (Finishing Line), and Long Climb into Grace (FootHills). Letterpress editions of The Herodotus Poems (Brooding Heron) and Volcano Blue, Tide Turn, and A Wild Taste (May Day) are in the Special Collections at the University of Washington, Stanford, British Library, Multnomah County Library, University of Puget Sound, and Bainbridge Island Museum of Art. At the University of Washington, she earned a MA in English literature and creative writing and an environmental manager certificate. She writes interpretive signage for natural history museums, land trusts, and parks. As staff, she compiled acquisition baselines for the local land trust and park district. Her Vashon trail guide is a best seller. Empty Bowl will publish Ann’s collection Wild Cucumber in spring 2025. annspiers.com