Neli Moody is a writer and a lecturer at San Jose State University, where she received her M.F.A. in
Creative Writing. She was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and has been writing poems since she was nine years
old. As a bi-racial child growing up during turbulent times, she saw in nature a refuge. She aims for a
painterly specificity of color and musicality. The poems must sing.
Insatiably curious, Neli has studied, among many subjects, literature, music, art history, architecture, Latin,
French and Italian, ethnic folklore and dance, geology and religion. She plays the piano, violin, and guitar,
has appeared onstage acting, singing, and dancing, and has been involved in professional theatre for 32
years in many capacities.
Neli won the San Jose State faculty-nominated Dorrit Sibley Award for outstanding creative achievement in
2005, and the Marjorie McLaughlin Folendorf award for outstanding achievement in creative writing in 2006.
She was honored three times with the James Phelan Award for poetry, in 1987, 2004 and 2005. In 2005, she
also won the Academy of American Poets’ Virginia Araujo Award. Her work has appeared in Reed, Brick
and Mortar Review, Appalachian Times and Konch Magazine. She presented a paper at the "T.S. Eliot, Dante
and the European Tradition: An International Symposium in January, 2008" on Renaissance art and Modern
Poetry.
Neli has read her poetry throughout the San Francisco Bay and Santa Cruz areas. In experiences gained
from world travel, sailing and scuba diving, spelunking and rock climbing, flying and skiing, are the seeds of
her poems. She is a resident of the Central Coast, where she is currently writing her fourth collection of
poetry as she edits two others. She is married with one adult daughter, four adult stepchildren,
grandchildren, and a beautiful Chow/Retriever named Jomo. Favorite pastimes include gourmet cooking,
Polynesian dancing, art history and music. Current interesting reads: Home by Marilynne Robinson, The
Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie, anything by Dylan Thomas or Derek Walcott. There are so many
wonderful poems to re-read and discover. I return to ones like "Love Calls Us to the Things of This World"
by Richard Wilbur again and again. I gravitate towards the Southern poets, the Caribbean, and the Irish
poets. Most hauntingly romantic music: the Adagietto of Mahler's Symphony in C Sharp Minor. First heard it
as the theme for Death in Venice with Dirk Bogard. Exquisite, especially Bernstein with the Wiemer
Philharmoniker.
Creative Writing. She was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and has been writing poems since she was nine years
old. As a bi-racial child growing up during turbulent times, she saw in nature a refuge. She aims for a
painterly specificity of color and musicality. The poems must sing.
Insatiably curious, Neli has studied, among many subjects, literature, music, art history, architecture, Latin,
French and Italian, ethnic folklore and dance, geology and religion. She plays the piano, violin, and guitar,
has appeared onstage acting, singing, and dancing, and has been involved in professional theatre for 32
years in many capacities.
Neli won the San Jose State faculty-nominated Dorrit Sibley Award for outstanding creative achievement in
2005, and the Marjorie McLaughlin Folendorf award for outstanding achievement in creative writing in 2006.
She was honored three times with the James Phelan Award for poetry, in 1987, 2004 and 2005. In 2005, she
also won the Academy of American Poets’ Virginia Araujo Award. Her work has appeared in Reed, Brick
and Mortar Review, Appalachian Times and Konch Magazine. She presented a paper at the "T.S. Eliot, Dante
and the European Tradition: An International Symposium in January, 2008" on Renaissance art and Modern
Poetry.
Neli has read her poetry throughout the San Francisco Bay and Santa Cruz areas. In experiences gained
from world travel, sailing and scuba diving, spelunking and rock climbing, flying and skiing, are the seeds of
her poems. She is a resident of the Central Coast, where she is currently writing her fourth collection of
poetry as she edits two others. She is married with one adult daughter, four adult stepchildren,
grandchildren, and a beautiful Chow/Retriever named Jomo. Favorite pastimes include gourmet cooking,
Polynesian dancing, art history and music. Current interesting reads: Home by Marilynne Robinson, The
Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie, anything by Dylan Thomas or Derek Walcott. There are so many
wonderful poems to re-read and discover. I return to ones like "Love Calls Us to the Things of This World"
by Richard Wilbur again and again. I gravitate towards the Southern poets, the Caribbean, and the Irish
poets. Most hauntingly romantic music: the Adagietto of Mahler's Symphony in C Sharp Minor. First heard it
as the theme for Death in Venice with Dirk Bogard. Exquisite, especially Bernstein with the Wiemer
Philharmoniker.
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atalantacreative
| Neli Moody at Pt. Lobos, one of my favorite places in the world |
