Activities: Tombstone design; Assumption Abbey Cemetery, Richardton, North Dakota

Poet David Dwyer grew up just north of New York City and commuted to Manhattan for high school. He later relocated with his wife, writer Kathleen Norris, to Lemmon, South Dakota, where she inherited her maternal grandparents’ farm.

Dwyer’s debut poetry collection, Ariana Olisvos: Her Last Works and Days, received the prestigious Juniper Prize and was published in 1976 by the University of Massachusetts Press. His second collection, Other Men and Other Women, was completed with the support of a $20,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and published in 1988 by Sandhills Press in Ord, Nebraska. In addition to these collections, Dwyer’s poetry appeared in prominent anthologies and literary magazines, including The New York Quarterly, The Agni Review, and The Virginia Quarterly Review.

David Dwyer passed away in 2003 at the age of 57 after a prolonged illness, leaving behind a legacy of vivid and contemplative poetry.