ITHACA, N.Y. -- Kate Light, 2004 visiting writer in the Cornell University Department of English, will give a poetry reading Wednesday, March 10, at 7:30 p.m. in the auditorium at 3330 Carol Tatkon Center on North Campus. The reading is free and open to the public, and a reception will follow.

Light is the author ofThe Laws of Falling Bodies , winner of the 1997 Nicholas Roerich Prize from Story Line Press,Open Slowly (Zoo Press, 2003) andOceanophony, a full-length concert collaboration with composer Bruce Adolphe.

"Kate Light is a major discovery for me," said Alice Fulton, the Ann S. Bowers Professor of English at Cornell. "It's not often that I find a poet whose work I like so much. Her poems take surprising turns. I love them most for their music and deep feeling; they have a kind of emotional honesty, an unsparing quality. She never flinches. And yet the writing is lovely -- with the loveliness of music and structure."

Light's poetry has appeared in many noted journals, includingThe Paris Review, The Dark Horse ,Western Humanities Review ,Hudson Review ,The Washington Post Book World ,The Formalist andJanus . She has been featured three times on Garrison Keillor's National Public Radio program "Writer's Almanac" and is included in the anthologiesThe Penguin Book of the Sonnet, Poetry Daily :366 Poems from the World's Most Popular Poetry Website andAmerican Poetry :The Next Generation . She also recently composed lyrics for the Disney animated featureMulan II .

Light is the recipient of numerous awards, among them an Academy of American Poets Prize and a Bossak/Heilbron Foundation Grant.

In addition to being a poet and a teacher of creative writing, Light is a professional violinist in New York and member of the New York City Opera Orchestra. She also has published numerous essays and reviews on orchestral music.