Red Hen Press

When writing my first collection of poems, The Forage House (Red Hen, 2013), I had the privilege of spending a month in residence at the American Antiquarian Society. I was fresh out of my MFA at Boston University, newly minted as “a working poet,” though I didn’t fully know yet what that would come to mean for me. I was working on poems about history, and the American Antiquarian Society had invited me to come.

Set in Virginia and Philadelphia during the mid-19th century, Suck on the Marrow (2010, Red Hen Press) traces the experiences of self-emancipated bondswomen, kidnapped Northern-born blacks, free people of color, and the slaves of a large plantation and small household. The interconnected narratives of six fictionalized characters use traceable dates, facts, and locations to investigate moving aspects of American history.