Poetry Book Party

OPEN TO THE PUBLIC | Please join us for a book party and signing with Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Monica Ferrell, and Devon Walker-Figueroa '15, all of whom have previously taught at Bennington, now celebrating their new books The New Economy, The Future, and Lazarus Species. Featuring food, drink, and short readings from the writers—this event is free and open to all!

A shuttle will be available to transport students from Campus Safety to the Frost Museum starting at 5:00 pm.

Gabrielle Calvocoressi is the author of The New Economy (Copper Canyon, 2025), a finalist for the National Book Award. Their previous collections, all from Persea Books, include The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart (2005); Apocalyptic Swing (2009), a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize); and Rocket Fantastic (2017), winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Their poems have been published in The Baffler, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, The New York Times, The New Yorker, and Poetry. The 2022-23 Beatrice Shepherd Blane Fellow at the Harvard-Radcliffe Institute, Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill.

Monica Ferrell is the author of three books of poetry, including The Future (Four Way Books, 2026), You Darling Thing (Four Way Books, 2018), a finalist for the Kingsley Tufts Award and the Believer Book Award in Poetry; and Beasts for the Chase (Sarabande, 2008), a finalist for the Asian American Writers Workshop Prize in Poetry. Her work has appeared in American Poetry Review, The Baffler, Boston Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, and The Yale Review. Recognized with residencies at the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, the MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo, she has taught fiction and poetry for the MFA Programs at Columbia University and Bennington College, and is Professor of Creative Writing at Purchase College (SUNY). Born in New Delhi, India, she lives in North Bennington, Vermont.

Devon Walker-Figueroa '15 is the author of Lazarus Species (Milkweed, 2025), a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize; and Philomath (Milkweed, 2021), a winner of the National Poetry Series and the Levis Reading Prize, and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Prize. Recent work has appeared in American Poetry Review, Bennington Review, The Nation, New England Review, The New York Review of Books, Ploughshares, and Poetry. A 2015 alum of Bennington College, she holds an MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and an MFA in Fiction from NYU, and returned to Bennington as visiting faculty for the 2024-25 academic year. She is currently an Assistant Professor of English at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA.