Connie Voisine was surprised when she learned she was selected to receive the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. The New Mexico State University professor will be recognized for her significant contributions to literature, which include publishing several books of poetry and earning accolades such as a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Voisine is the only writer among the seven 2025 honorees to be honored at a ceremony on Oct. 16 in Santa Fe.
“I really feel grateful,” Voisine said. “Poetry has given me a great life. I feel that giving to other people in your community does come back to you. Moving to Las Cruces from the Northeast, as I did in 2001, I said I’d commit to a year, but here I am 20-something years later. So, this poetry thing has worked so well for me.”
Voisine is one of the most accomplished poets in southern New Mexico. In addition to a Guggenheim Fellowship, she was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship in 2021 to Belfast, which was the writing sabbatical she needed to write a book-length poem, “The Bower,” about the troubles in Northern Ireland. Two previous poetry collections received recognition: “Cathedral of the North” in 2001, which won an award from the Association of Writers & Writing Programs; and “Rare High Meadow of Which I Might Dream” in 2008 was a Los Angeles Times book award finalist.
Voisine has taught poetry writing at NMSU in the creative writing program for 24 years. She has published four books of poetry, with another recently accepted for publication, one chapbook of poetry and has a book of translated poems under consideration.
Voisine is bilingual. She grew up on the border of Maine and French Canada, and her first language was French. In high school she began writing poetry but didn’t know it could be a career.
When she started college at Yale University, she assumed she’d become a lawyer or a doctor but ended up majoring in American studies instead, then moved to New York City, where she supported herself as a waitress, surrounded by other working artists of all kinds.
After earning a Master of Fine Arts at the University of California-Irvine and a doctorate from the University of Utah, Voisine first taught at the University of Hartford in Connecticut, then landed at NMSU in 2001.
The way she teaches poetry provides her students with tools to ask themselves questions.
“You have to have the energy and room for the imagination to start stirring,” Voisine said. “I tell students various ways to start a poem, the various ways poems can operate, and that is often enough to get them writing about their experiences or what they’re thinking.”
For example, Layli Long Soldier is a New Mexican poet from Santa Fe and an indigenous Native American poet. She responded to a public apology to the Native American communities of the U.S. written during the Obama administration. Voisine introduced it to her students asking them to write about a legal document that had an impact on their lives and how they might enter into a conversation with that document. One student wrote about their adoption and what a world that document opened up for them.
“A life in poetry is about coming together with other poets, which is why teaching is a great thing for a poet to do,” Voisine said. “You come together with other poets, and they learn from you and you learn from them. I gain just as much from my students as from my peers. We nurture each other in ways that has made my life so much better. I don’t know where I’d be without the community around poetry.”
Voisine is very proud that the new U.S. Poet Laureate is from New Mexico. Arthur Sze recently was named the 25th U.S. Poet Laureate in September and began his term in October 2025.
“Usually, the Poet Laureate’s mission is to get people to read more poetry. But Arthur says he’s going to get people to write poetry,” Voisine said. “He wants every American to try it. I think he's right. I don't believe that only certain people can write poems. I wonder what could happen when more Americans bring themselves to poetry. Poetry always meets you halfway. I just can’t wait to see what Arthur does.”
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CUTLINE: Connie Voisine, New Mexico State University professor and poet, is among seven people who will receive the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts this month. (Courtesy photo)