Many thanks to Kay for the below guest post. If you are interested in doing a guest post please contact me at newauthoronline (at) gmail . com

Hello! My name is Kay, and I’m a poet. I don’t just love writing poetry, though – I also love reading it. My poetry habit began when I was a child and I discovered Shel Silverstein’s work (if you haven’t read A Light in the Attic or Where the Sidewalk Ends, add them to your to-be-read list pronto). When I was ten, I discovered Joan Walsh Anglund’s work; The Song of Love is one of my most treasured books.

As I grew older, so, too, did the poetry I read. Nineteenth century poets, eighteenth century poets – none were too musty or dusty for me. I finally worked my way back to Shakespeare, of whom I couldn’t get enough. I had to read his sonnets with a dictionary, but I didn’t mind. It only became a problem when I’d get caught up in reading the dictionary instead of the sonnets. 🙂

But there are worse problems to have. Reading the dictionary turned out to be a major boon to my own poetry by increasing my vocabulary. On the flip side, though, my husband now refuses to play word games with me. Learning about the history and formations of different words is fascinating, though, especially if, say, you’re trying to create your own language for the fantasy world you’ve spent a decade creating.

Not that I would know anything about that… 🙂

Poetry has enriched my life in countless ways, and I could no sooner choose a favorite poem than I could a favorite star in the sky. What about you? What are some of your favorite poems? How has poetry affected your life?

As a girl, Kay dreamed of being swept off her feet by her one true love. At the age of 24, it finally happened…and he’s never let her forget it. A mild-mannered secretary by day and a determined word-wrangler by night, she battles the twin evils of distraction and procrastination in order to write fantastical tales of wuv…twue wuv…with a few haiku thrown in for good measure.

The author of Tuesday Daydreams: A Journal in Verse and A Song for All Seasons: A Journal in Verse, Kay is currently hard at work on the first book in a fantasy trilogy. She resides in the midst of an Iowa corn field with her devoted husband and his mighty red pen; four crazy, cute kids; and an assortment of adorably small, furry animals.

Tuesday Daydreams captures the life and imagination of the author in vivid detail, touching on joy and loss, life’s everyday hassles, and the many faces of Mother Nature. A Song for All Seasons paints vivid pictures of the Iowa landscape in all its glory, in addition to intimate portraits of family life. From frost-covered windowpanes and snowy vistas to rolling green fields and bright blue skies, each poem is a peek into a fading world of untamed beauty. If you’d like to pick up your own copy of Tuesday Daydreams or A Song for All Seasons, you can find them at Amazon, Amazon UK, Createspace, Smashwords, iBooks, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble.

Care to save her from the chaos? You can find Kay in the all the usual places:

At her blog, where she shares random pictures and silly poems; on Facebook, where she shares things about cats and books; on Twitter, where she shares whatever pops into her head; on Pinterest, where she shares delicious recipes and images from her fantasy world; on Instagram, where she shares pictures of pretty sunsets; and on Tumblr, where she shares all of the above.