Paulann Petersen

Paulann Petersen (born 1942) is an American poet from the state of Oregon. A native of Portland, she was Oregon's sixth poet laureate.

Biography Petersen was born in 1942 in Portland, Oregon, where she graduated from Franklin High School in Southeast Portland. Following high school she went to Pomona College in Claremont, California, before returning to Oregon. She twice has won Carloyn Kizer Poetry Awards, and also was the recipient of the Stewart Holbrook Award, given for contributions to Oregon literature. Petersen was appointed as Oregon's Poet Laureate in 2010, the sixth in state history, replacing Lawson Inada. The Voluptuary was published in 2010, and Understory was published in 2013. She was given a second term as poet laureate in 2012, with her term then ending in April 2014.