Renee Emerson is a poet, online writing instructor, and homeschooling mom of five.
She is the author of three poetry collections; her first collection, Keeping Me Still (Winter Goose Publishing 2014), was a finalist in the Jacar Press Julie Suk Award for Best Poetry Book Published by an Independent Press in 2014. Her second collection, Threshing Floor, was published by Jacar Press in 2016, and Church Ladies was published by Fernwood Press in 2023.
She is also the author of several poetry chapbooks, the most recent of which is the The Commonplace Misfortunes of Everyday Plants (Belle Point Press). Her middle-grade novel is Why Silas Miller Must Learn to Ride a Bike (Winter Goose Publishing 2022). Her poetry has recently appeared in publications such as Shenandoah, Windhover, Poet Lore, Dappled Things, Contrary, Christian Courier, The Rabbit Room, Coffee + Crumbs, and Ekstasis, among others.
She holds an MFA in poetry from Boston University, where she was also awarded the Academy of American Poets Prize. In 2016, she was awarded an Individual Artist Grant by the Arkansas Arts Council. In recent years, she has received multiple Pushcart Prize nominations in poetry. Currently, she teaches online classes for Indiana Wesleyan University and Shorter University.
Originally from Tennessee, she has lived all over the South before settling in Missouri with her husband and children.