Helen Curtin Moskey

Helen Curtin Moskey (March 27, 1931, Hartford, Connecticut – March 25, 2003, Hartford) was an Irish-American poet of dual U.S.-Irish nationality.

Biography[]

In 1994, she was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, with honors, from Trinity College (Connecticut), Hartford, Connecticut. Her senior thesis was titled A Kerry Ethnography: A History of the Descendants of Owen O'Sullivan Mors, , Caragh Lake, Co. Kerry, 1926-1992. The Kerry Ethnography was later published posthumously in an anthology of her writings on Ireland and family history titled The O'Sullivans of Muingaphuca.^[1]

She subsequently studied poetry with several established American poets, including Mark Doty, Stanley Kunitz, and Yusef Komunyakaa; at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts; and at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. Additionally, the Irish poet Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin was a friend and advisor. Moskey's work appeared in occasional compilations of poetry. At the time of her death, she was preparing a volume of her selected poetry for publication.

Her experiences as the child of an Irish immigrant mother; her extended stays at the family ancestral home at Muingaphuca, Caragh Lake, County Kerry; and her experience as a mid-century American woman who raised five children through the intense social transformation of American life from the post-war era to the 1970s, were powerful influences on the tone, style, and subject matter of her poetry.

References[]