| Jamie Parsley | |
| Birth Date: | 8 December 1969 |
| Birth Place: | Fargo, North Dakota, United States |
| Occupation: | Poet, Episcopal priest |
| Period: | 1990s-present |
Jamie Parsley (born December 8, 1969) is an American poet and Episcopal priest. He is the author of twelve books of poems and an associate poet laureate for the state of North Dakota.[1]
Born in Fargo, North Dakota and raised near Harwood, North Dakota, Parsley received a master of fine arts degree in creative writing from Vermont College at Norwich University.[2] He studied at the School of Theology at Thornloe University in Sudbury, Ontario, St. Joseph’s College, Standish, Maine and received a Master's Degree from Nashotah House Episcopal Seminary, Nashotah, Wisconsin.[3] Parsley was ordained as an Episcopal priest in 2004, became the priest-in-charge of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church Fargo in 2008.[3] Parsley began teaching Theology, Ethics, Philosophy, Literature and Writing at the University of Mary's Fargo campus in 2003. Parsley published his first book of poems, Paper Doves, Falling and Other Poems in 1992. Parsley’s book, Cloud, is a book-length poem on the bombing of Hiroshima. Parsley's book of collected haiku, no stars, no moon: new and collected haiku, was published in 2004.
Parsley was appointed an Associate Poet Laureate of North Dakota by Poet Laureate Larry Woiwode in 2004.[4]
Parsley’s tenth book, Fargo, 1957, was published in 2010, and chronicled the stories of the victims and survivors of the tornado that struck Fargo, North Dakota on June 20, 1957[1] and killed two of his mother's cousins.[5] A reviewer in the High Plains Reader writes that Parsley's shows a "willingness to present himself and his own obsession honestly—the process of discovering these people and what they have left behind."[5]