Deni Naffziger is the author of two full-length collections of poetry, Desire To Stay (Stockport Flats Press, 2014) and Strange Bodies (Shadelandhouse Modern Press, 2023), as well as A Story of Flying – a children's coloring tale supported by the Ohio Arts Council, 2006, translated into Spanish in 2010 – and 2 chapbooks. She co-authored Revenants: A Story of Many Lives with poet Jane Ann Fuller, which was awarded a special project grant by the Ohio Arts Council.
Naffziger is a Weatherford Award and Pushcart Prize nominee and was a finalist for the 2024 Eric Hoffer Medal Provocateur Award. She is a Fulbright Scholar (1990-91)
From 1985-2002, Naffziger edited Riverwind Literary Magazine (Nelsonville, Ohio). She directed the Writers' Collaborative at Passion Works Studio in Athens, Ohio for 25 years, where she partnered college writing students with adults with disabilities to write poems, short stories, and essays that often reflected the unique perspectives of people who live with a disability. As a retired educator, she serves as Poet-In-Residence at Passion Works.
Her work has appeared in journals including New Ohio Review, Atticus Review, Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel, Spoon River Review, Shiela-Na-Gig, West Branch, Main Street Rag, Pikeville Review, YARN, Pudding Magazine, Asylum, The MacGuffin, and Northern Appalachian Review.
Chapbooks: Intervals (Pikeville Press, 1992), Close To Home (Spoon River Quarterly, 1988).
Exhibitions:
No One Knows What Living In People's Houses Is, Collaboration between painter, Steve Ward and poet, Deni Naffziger, Murfreesboro Cultural Arts Center, June, 2019
Still Life – A photo exhibition with words, Collaboration between photographer Mark Hackworth and poet, Deni Naffziger, Weber, Gallery, University of Pikeville, TN, September 2021
Still Life – A photo exhibition with words, Collaboration between photographer Mark Hackworth and poet, Deni Naffziger, Secret Studio, Franklinton Arts District, Columbus, Ohio, October, 2022
Still Life – A photo exhibition with words, Collaboration between photographer Mark Hackworth and poet, Deni Naffziger, Dairy Barn Cultural Arts Center, Athens, Ohio
Naffziger earned a BFA in Creative Writing from Bowling Green State University (Ohio) and an MA in Literature/Creative Writing from Ohio University.
