RARE "Poet Laureate of Texas" Vassar Miller Hand Signed Poem For Sale

Up for sale a RARE! "Poet Laureate of Texas" Vassar Miller Hand Signed Poem. 

October 31, 1998) was a writer and poet. She served as Poet Laureate of Texas

(1988-1989). Miller was born in Houston, Texas, the daughter of real estate investor Jesse G.

Miller. She began writing as a child, composing on a typewriter due to

the cerebral palsy which

affected her speech and movement. She attended the University of Houston,

receiving her B.A. and M.A. in English. In 1956, Miller published her first

volume of poetry, Adam's Footprint. Her poems, most of which dealt

with either her strong religious faith or her experiences as a person with a disability,

were widely praised for their rigorous formality, clarity, and emotional

impact. Her poems have been published in hundreds of periodicals and more than

50 anthologies, including Spanish translations in Latin American journals. The

lasting power of Ms. Miller's poetry and its distinctiveness was aptly

described by many, including author Larry McMurtry. Reflecting on the qualities that make the work

of only a few artists survive, Mr. McMurtry wrote of Vassar Miller and her

poetry: “It’s easy to point out her clarity, her precision, her intelligence,

her honesty. But I want to mention one other quality that I think she has both

as a person and as a poet, and that is her tenacity. It’s not simply brute

survival that a poet is involved with, although sometimes they are; it’s more

than that. It’s a tenacity that has to be at one and the same time, physical,

intellectual, and moral. I believe this tenacity is something that Vassar

Miller is richly endowed with.” Over the course of a literary career which

spanned almost forty years, Miller published ten volumes of poetry in all.

Vassar Miller's ten volumes of poetry, published between 1956 and 1984 were

collected in 1991 under the title If I Had Wheels or Love. An outspoken

advocate for the rights and dignity of the handicapped, Miller also edited a

collection of poetry and short stories about persons with disabilities

titled Despite This Flesh. Miller received many awards and

accolades for her poetry in her home state. Three of her books won the annual

poetry prize of the Texas Institute of Letters. In 1982 and 1988 Miller was

named Poet Laureate of Texas, and in 1997 she was named to the Texas Women's

Hall of Fame by the Governor's Commission for Women. In addition to her writing

and teaching, Ms. Miller was involved in civic work and in 1989 the Young

Women's Christian Association named her an Outstanding Woman of Houston. Vassar

Miller died October 31, 1998.