Eileen Albrizio is an American writer of poetry and prose, a professional proofreader and editor http://www.angelfire.com/art/albrizio/editing.html, and a former broadcast journalist. She was born in Hartford, CT where she still resides. Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary publications including the Common Ground Review and the Underwood Review. She is the author of three print volumes of poetry: Messy on the Inside, Rain – Dark as Water in Winter, and Perennials: New & Selected Poems, all published by Ye Olde Font Shoppe Press. Perennials was nominated for the 2008 Connecticut Book Award. On the Edge, a recitation of her poetry on compact disk was produced with the help of a 2003 Poetry Fellowship from the Greater Hartford Arts Council. She has also penned several plays, three novels, numerous short stories and essays, and ghostwritten several projects. She is a 2008 recipient of the New Boston Fund Individual Artist Fellowship. Albrizio has taught poetry and creative writing in several colleges and cultural institutions as well as the York Correctional Institute, Connecticut’s only maximum-security prison for women.

In 2005, Albrizio left a twelve-year career as a radio news host and broadcast journalist. Nine of those twelve years were spent working for National Public Radio and its Connecticut affiliate, WNPR in Hartford, CT. During her broadcasting career, her newscasts, spot news stories and featured stories were repeatedly awarded first-prize honors from the Associated Press

Associated Press

The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...

 and the Society of Professional Journalists

Society of Professional Journalists

The Society of Professional Journalists , formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, is one of the oldest organizations representing journalists in the United States. It was established in April 1909 at DePauw University, and its charter was designed by William Meharry Glenn. The ten founding members of...

.

Albrizio graduated from the Connecticut School of Broadcasting

Connecticut School of Broadcasting

The Connecticut School of Broadcasting is a national career college based in Farmington, Connecticut, United States with a focus on Television and Radio certification and training in areas such as television anchoring, commercial radio performance and journalism including production...

 and then went on to earn her BFA in Theatre from Central Connecticut State University

Central Connecticut State University

Central Connecticut State University is a state university in New Britain, Connecticut, United States.The school was moved to its present campus in 1922...

 as well as her Masters of Arts in English from the same University. In addition to writing and teaching, Albrizio assists her husband, Wayne Horgan, who is a Realtor in Connecticut

Connecticut

Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...

. The two have owned and operated Heroes & Hitters, a comic book store in Rocky Hill, CT, since 1989.

Messy on the Inside

Messy on the Inside was published in 1998. Albrizio's first book of poetry, it consists of 60 poems written entirely in formal verse. Utilizing such traditional forms as the English sonnet

Sonnet

A sonnet is one of several forms of poetry that originate in Europe, mainly Provence and Italy. A sonnet commonly has 14 lines. The term "sonnet" derives from the Occitan word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning "little song" or "little sound"...

, pantoum

Pantoum

The pantoum is a form of poetry similar to a villanelle in that there are repeating lines throughout the poem. It is composed of a series of quatrains; the second and fourth lines of each stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the next. This pattern continues for any number of stanzas,...

, villanelle

Villanelle

A villanelle is a poetic form that entered English-language poetry in the 19th century from the imitation of French models. The word derives from the Italian villanella from Latin villanus . A villanelle has only two rhyme sounds...

, sestina and haiku

Haiku

' , plural haiku, is a very short form of Japanese poetry typically characterised by three qualities:* The essence of haiku is "cutting"...

, this book spotlights Albrizio's ability to master form without losing the poem's accessibility. From the success of this book, Albrizio created an acclaimed formal verse workshop.

Rain - Dark as Water in Winter

Rain – Dark as Water in Winter was published in 2001. This book consists of a one-act play written in verse and 30 poems written in traditional forms. The play, Rain, was honored by the Writer’s Digest as one of the best written one-act plays of 1997. The two-character play focuses on the cycle of an emotionally abusive relationship between Rain and her lover, Perfidy. The play has a profound iambic rhythm, while the rhyme, although consistently placed, is only subtly heard.

Perennials: New & Selected Poems

Perennials: New & Selected Poems marks Albrizio’s break from traditional forms. It was published in 2007. Although it includes some of her most well received poems from her previous two books, it also consists of over 30 new poems that are largely written in free verse

Free verse

Free verse is a form of poetry that refrains from consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any other musical pattern.Poets have explained that free verse, despite its freedom, is not free. Free Verse displays some elements of form...

 or in forms of her own creation. She continues to teach poetry workshops, but has since added a segment on applying the rhetorical devices used in formal verse to free-verse writing. The Greater Hartford Arts Council and the New Boston Fund have honored with excellence several free-verse poems that were later included in the first chapter of this book.

External links

• Books in which Eileen Albrizio is referenced http://www.amazon.com/s?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=%22eileen+albrizio%22