Ryan set for 2nd Poet Laureate term

WASHINGTON, April 15 (UPI) -- Librarian of Congress James H. Billington says he has appointed Kay Ryan to serve a second term as U.S. Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry.

"Kay has been an uplifting presence as Laureate during the past year, and her poetry continues to awe and delight readers," Billington said in a statement. "In her appearances at the Library, Kay has captivated audiences with her fresh insights into the beauty, power and importance of poetry. We are looking forward to her announcement this fall of a project she hopes to establish, and we are glad she is available to serve in this important position in 2009-2010."

Ryan's first term is to conclude May 7 when she gives a reading at the Library of Congress in the Coolidge Auditorium on the ground level of the Thomas Jefferson Building in Washington, D.C.

"Poems are transmissions from the depths of whoever wrote them to the depths of the reader," Ryan said. "To a greater extent than with any other kind of reading, the reader of a poem is making that poem, is inhabiting those words in the most personal sort of way. That doesn't mean that you read a poem and make it whatever you want it to be, but that it's operating so deeply in you that it is the most special kind of reading."