Stephanie McKee

Stephanie has written stories and poems since her teenage years.She has a B.A. in English Literature and Psychology, with Psychology studies to Masters level.  Post-graduate qualifications in Educational Technology and Celebrant Studies followed. She had a 25 year career teaching English and Music in schools at all levels of the education system. In 2010 she self-published a book of poetry, "Crystals in the Streambed: Selected Poems 1980 - 2010", and in 2016 published a second poetry book, "Walking the Manuka Path - selected poems  2011 -2016 ". In 2023 , her third volume of poetry, " Singing in the Key of Epiphany," was published. Currently Stephanie is writing a "hybrid memoir". Stephanie lives in a solar-powered ecovillage in north-east Coromandel Peninsula from where she serves the local community as an independent marriage and funeral celebrant.

Genre:

  • Adult Non-Fiction
  • Autobiography / Memoir
  • Feature Articles
  • Poetry

Skills:

  • Freelance Writing
  • Poetry Readings
  • Research

Branch:

Auckland

Location:

Waikawau Bay, Coromandel Peninsula.

Publications:

Crystals in the Streambed

Selected Poems 1980 - 2010. This collection of poems by Stephanie McKee moves from rural to urban settings, through motherhood, study and working as a music teacher. The fluidity and freedom of water is a constant motif as well as the replenishing power of light. A sense of quirky comic irony stands alongside more serious commentary against war and injustice. There are images of resilience, gratitude and hope in defiance of the grief and disillusionments encountered along the way.

Walking the Manuka Path

In this second collection of poetry, Stephanie explores the themes of resilience, reverence and resistance. Her poems are vignettes, moments in time, often more akin to folk tales, rather than obscure or abstract.They range from ironic to mysterious, from narrative to observational.

Singing in the Key of Epiphany

This is a collection of poems gathered from 2016 - 2023.  There are five groups of poems around the themes of Travel and Places, Friendships and Family, The Shadows,Saving Papatūānuku and Reflections and Meditations.  Stephanie plays with a variety of poetic forms ranging from limericks and haiku to ballads and shape poems. The theme of epiphany refers to those eureka! moments, or sudden insights that trigger " a poem coming on". The relationship between creativity and mental health is explored.

When the poem is written I feel complete,

like a butterfly released so delicate and sweet,

like a gift of the gods I cannot repeat,

another mysterious arrival on my paper sheet.

 

So do befriend your Muse, whatever shape its in,

could be music, art or tattoos on your skin.

With a Muse by your side, you’ll feel peace within,

and stronger to face life’s thick and thin.