Gary Metras is the author of the poetry books: Vanishing Points (Dos Madres Press, 2021), River Voice II (Adastra Press, 2020), White Storm (Presa Press, 2018), Captive in the Here (Cervena Barva Press, 2018), The Moon in the Pool (Presa Press, April 2015), The Night Watches (Adastra Press, 1981), Destiny’s Calendar (Samisdat Press, 1985), and Until There Is Nothing Left (Ridgeway Press, 2003).
Chapbooks: River Voice (Adastra Press, 2019), Two Bloods: Fly Fishing Poems (Split Oak Press, 2010), Francis d’Assisi 2008 (Finishing Line Press, 2008) and Greatest Hits 1980-2006 (Pudding House, 2007), along with nine other chapbooks.
Periodical Publications: Over 400 of his essays, reviews, and chiefly poems have appeared in over 300 journals such as The American Voice, Another Chicago Magazine, The Bellingham Review, The Boston Review of Books, California Quarterly, The Common, Connecticut Poetry Review, Gray's Sporting Journal, English Journal, Hurricane Review, Istanbul Literary Review, New England Watershed, North Dakota Quarterly, Paterson Literary Review, Poetry, Poetry East, Poetry Salzburg Review, Sanctuary (Journal of the Mass. Audubon Society), Wind, Wild Earth, Yankee, Tears in the Fence (UK), and former U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry.
Anthology Publications: Pushing the Envelope: Epistolary Poems (Lamar U. Pr.), Working Words: Punching the Clock and Kicking Out the Jams (Coffee House), Visiting Frost: Poems Inspired by the Life and Work of Robert Frost (Iowa), Proposing on the Brooklyn Bridge (Grayson), Birth: A Literary Companion (Iowa), and Atomic Ghosts: Poets Respond to the Nuclear Age (Coffee House) and a dozen plus others.
Awards: The Inaugural Poet Laureate of the City of Easthampton, MA, 2018-2019; The Massachusetts Fellowship in Poetry. His White Storm was selected as a Must Read Poetry Book in the Massachusetts Books of the Year Program 2019. Two Bloods: Fly Fishing Poems won the Split Oak Press Chapbook Award, and his Francis d’Assisi 2008 was selected as a Recommended Massachusetts Book of the Year (2009) by the Mass. Center for the Book. Nominated for the Pushcart Prize several times.
Public Readings: He has read his poetry from cafes to universities, including Kent State, Univ. of Detroit-Mercy, Detroit Arts Center,
Sarah Lawrence College, Assumption College Library, Concord Poetry Center, UMass Amherst Inside/out Series, Amherst Books, Broadside Book Shop, The Globe Bookstore, Grolier Poetry Bookshop, Unbuttoned at Luthier's.
Presentions and Panels: “Small Is Beautiful” (Panel and Presenter), Nat’l Writers Union & Univ. of Mass—Con’t Ed. Writers Conference; Publishers Panel, Sarah Lawrence Summer Seminar; “The Poetry of Place,” Conn.River Education Institute, (MA); “Teacher, Reader, Writer: Teaching Literature to High School Students from a Poet’s Perspective,” The Five College-Public School Partnership, Mt. Holyoke College; and “Poets Symposium,” Lecture, Reading and Introductions for “The Art of the Book in the Pioneer Valley,” Northampton, MA; Walloon Writers Retreat, Walloon Lake, MI;
Editor: publisher, editor, and letterpress printer of Adastra Press, 1979-2020.
Occupations: Store clerk, tobacco picker, short order cook, hod carrier, air traffic controller (U.S. Air Force), bookstore manager, high school English teacher, and college writing instructor.
Education: Chicopee High School, Chicopee, MA; University of Massachusetts Amherst, BA Magnum Cum Laude; Goddard College, MA.
Community: He is the past president of the Pioneer Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited, the non-profit cold water conseration organization; Easthampton, MA Literary Committee; Easthampton, MA Book Fair Committee; Easthammpton, MA Poet Laureate Selection Committee.
Hobbies: He fly fishes the streams and rivers of western Massachusetts as often as possible.
