Both Shoes Off

Jeanne Bryner�s family was part of Appalachia�s outmigration, and she considers living close to a dairy farm these many years a blessing. A graduate of Trumbull Memorial Hospital�s School of Nursing and Kent State

University�s Honors College, she has received awards for community service, nursing and writing. She worked as a staff nurse in pediatrics, Med-Surg, ICU, ER, Immediate Care, Periop-Pool, the IV team and Vlad Pediatrics where babies and children arrived like field flowers.Her prose and poetry appear in national and international journals, anthologies and textbooks, but working with her students, helping them find their voice has greatly enriched her life and writing. To facilitate the healing power

of language, Jeanne teaches writing workshops in cancer support groups, nursing homes, schools and universities.

Her books include Breathless, Blind Horse: Poems, Eclipse: Stories, Tenderly Lift Me: Nurses Honored, Celebrated and Remembered, The Wedding of Miss Meredith Mouse, No Matter How Many Windows (2011 Tillie Olsen Award from the Working Class Studies Association, ) Smoke: Poems (2012 American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year award, ) and

Early Farming Woman. Jeanne�s poetry has been adapted for the stage and performed in Ohio, Kentucky, West Virginia, New York, Texas, Pennsylvania and Edinburgh, Scotland. Her new play, Foxglove Canyon, was first performed in Akron at Summa Healthcare�s Humanities conference under the direction of Russell Zampino. With the support of Hiram College�s Center for Literature, Medicine and Biomedical Humanities,

her nursing poetry has been adapted and performed by Verb Ballets, Cleveland, Ohio. She has received writing fellowships from Bucknell University, the Ohio Arts Council (1997,

2007) and Vermont Studio Center.