Dilys Bennett Laing was an American poet.

She was educated in England, and Canada. She married Alexander Laing, a Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...

 graduate, and later professor, in 1936 and became an American citizen. They had one son.

She was a writer, poet, and artist. She was admired by such contemporary poets as Robert Lowell

Robert Lowell

Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV was an American poet, considered the founder of the confessional poetry movement. He was appointed the sixth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress where he served from 1947 until 1948...

. She died in 1960.

She was included in the Norton Anthology of Literature by Women

Norton Anthology of Literature by Women

The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women: The Traditions in English, published by W. W. Norton & Company, is one of the Norton Anthology series for use in English literary studies. It is edited by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar...

.

Her papers are held at Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...

.

Quotes

Women receive the insults of men with tolerance, having been bitten in the nipple by their toothless gums.

To be a woman and a writer is double mischief, for the world will slight her
who slights “the servile house,” and who would rather make odes than beds.

Journal contributions

• Growl Scares Dog, Good Housekeeping, New York, January, 1942
• Nautilus, Poetry Magazine, Volume 60, April 1942, Page 23
• To A Mathematician, June 13, 1942, The New Yorker
  The New Yorker
  The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
  
  , June 13, 1942, p. 17
• Eros Out of the Sea, Poetry Magazine, Volume 64, June 1944, Page 137
• 2 Poems, Yale Review Winter 1944
• That time of year, Harper's Magazine, January 1943, p.168
• Occult Adventure, Poetry Magazine, Volume 65, January 1945, Page 191
• Genesis and Exodus, Poetry Magazine, Volume 68, April 1946, Page 11
• Root and Branch, Poetry Magazine, Volume 68, April 1946, Page 11
• The Bell, Poetry Magazine, Volume 68, April 1946, Page 11
• Proof and Reproof, Yale Review
  Yale Review
  The Yale Review is the self-proclaimed oldest literary quarterly in the United States. It is published by Yale University.It was founded originally in 1819 as The Christian Spectator. At its origin it was published to support Evangelicalism, but over time began to publish more on history and...
  
  , Summer 1946
• Men at Work, Harper's Magazine, January 1948, p.38
• Love has so Terrible a Face, Yale Review Autumn 1947
• Rescue, Poetry Magazine, Volume 72, May 1948, Page 74
• The Uncreation, Poetry Magazine, Volume 72, May 1948, Page 74
• Welcome Song, Poetry Magazine, Volume 72, May 1948, Page 74
• Harsh Return, Poetry Magazine, Volume 75, March 1950, Page 332
• Time Is All a Year, Poetry Magazine, Volume 79, March 1952, Page 321
• The Proud, Poetry Magazine, Volume 79, March 1952, Page 321
• To Dolores Preserved, Poetry Magazine, Volume 79, March 1952, Page 321
• Dance of Burros, Poetry Magazine, Volume 81, December 1952, Page 174
• Afternoon of a Forethinker, Poetry Magazine, Volume 82, May 1953, Page 72
• Capsule Dragon, Poetry Magazine, Volume 82, August 1953, Page 255
• Saint Giotto of Assisi, Poetry Magazine, Volume 83, February 1954, Page 256
• I Shall Know, Poetry Magazine, Volume 83, February 1954, Page 256
• The Catch, Poetry Magazine, Volume 85, October 1954, Page 13
• Profan Witness, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Fall 1955
• Let Them Ask Their Husbands, The Nation
  The Nation
  The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...
  
  , January 4, 1958
• I Attend a Reception for a Visiting Celebrity, The Nation, May 24, 1958
• Walled City, The Nation, December 27, 1958
• Don't Tread on Us, The Nation, January 31, 1959
• The Compassionate Torturers, The Nation, April 23, 1960
• Threnody on the Demise of As and Now, The Nation, March 19, 1960
• The Dazzled Ones, The Nation, December 17, 1960
• The City and the Song, The Nation, February 25, 1961
• Picasso's Candlefire, Poetry Magazine, Volume 97, March 1961, Page 362
• The Swift Ships, Poetry Magazine, Volume 97, March 1961, Page 362
• Poems from a Cage, Poetry Magazine, Volume 101, December 1962, Page 209
• Maintenant, The Nation, July 27, 1963
• The Power, The Nation, August 24, 1963
• Flowers out of Rock, Poetry Magazine, Volume 104, April 1964, Page 14

Reviews

• Our Life in Poetry: Selected Essays and Reviews, M. L. Rosenthal, Persea Books (May 1991), ISBN 978-0892551491

• Theology Today:

This is a good book to hold in one's hand, a good book to take up and put down, to contemplate. It does not speak the jargon of the "contraceptive woman" of current journalism but the language of one in whom love developed human relationships in many ways. Wallace Stevens once wrote of "those who move about the world with the love of the real in their hearts." This poet did.

External references

• Poetry Magazine: The Historical Index