Voices in the Sky–A Book of Poems
by Nancy L. Davis
42 poems ~ 71 pages
Price: $15.00
Cover Art by K. VonDornBanks
Cover Design by Faris Kabaklic
Cover Layout by Jennifer Dotson
Publisher: Highland Park Poetry Press
ISBN-13: 979-8-9997122-1-9
To Order: www.Amazon.com or www.highlandparkpoetry.org
ABOUT THE BOOK:
It is little wonder that Voices in the Sky, by Nancy L. Davis, won the 2026 Prairie State Poetry Prize for best first or second collection of poems. By her own self-description, she fell hopelessly in love with language in her youth. Her poetry is informed by what poets do best: paint pictures out of the world that surrounds them. Voices dwells within the landscape of life. These are down-to-earth poems that become richer with each turn of the page.
ADVANCE PRAISE:
“Beautifully divided into three well-balanced sections, this collection is polished and luminous with every poem leading to a cohesive and satisfying whole.”
–Christine Swanberg, 2026 Prairie State Poetry Prize Judge & Poet Laureated Emerita of Rockford, IL.
“In these exquisite poems, Nancy L. Davis reveals her control of a rich world of her making, one driven by her observant powers: the spirit of sunflowers and jack-pines, of moose in Maine, reptiles coupling in the Everglades and so much more. Through her poetry Davis helps readers to comprehend it all.”
–Deborah Nash Ott, Occasional Grace
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nancy L. Davis is a poet, fiction writer, and retired Associate Professor of English. Her work has appeared in Cutthroat, The Banyan Review, Best of Philadelphia Stories, Connecticut River Review, Superpresent, The Dewdrop, Route9, Tulip Tree Review, Amethyst, Splash, The Ledge, and elsewhere. In 2019, she won a Fiction Fellowship to study in Tbilisi, Georgia via Summer Literary Seminars; and in 2020, her poems were long listed for the Disquiet Literary Seminar in Lisbon. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, awarded First Place in the Sandy Crimmins National Poetry Prize; received Honorable Mention in the Joy Harjo Poetry Award, the Atlanta Review International Merit Award, Second Place in The Ledge and The Plentitudes Fiction Contests, Honorable Mention in the Lorian Hemingway Short Fiction and The Plentitudes Fiction Contests, Finalist in the Tucson Festival of Books fiction competition, among others. Her poetry chapbook, Ghosts, was published in 2019 by Finishing Line Press. Her collection Voices in the Sky won The Prairie State Poetry Prize and is forthcoming in summer 2026 with Highland Park Poetry Press.
A native of Upstate New York, she lives with her husband Rick Cappelletti, Park Ridge, Illinois, and Long Beach, Indiana, on Lake Michigan. They have one grown daughter, Julia, and son-in-law Faris.
FROM THE BOOK:
Evening Prayers
1963
by Nancy Davis
evenings at my grandmother’s
house–dinner done, the day at rest
sunset hues casting copper
pots in silence
the time I favored lamb
roasts and poppyseed rolls
slipped into starched linens
the kind grown women wear
we’d kneel bedside
hands clasped, elbows out
reciting the Lord’s Prayer
and through abject obedience
was not an oath I
could oblige
the unraveling of Nana’s
chestnut hair, earnest alto
sighs, rosary beads clasped
in hands, children’s pleas
convinced my heart to pledge allegiance
to this spirit woman alchemizing
fabrics, tailoring suits, stretching
octaves like the weft and warp
on a loom
beating twice the life of each
of us, a nesting wren trilling overtime
out of breath, notes, and yarn.
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