The Geography of Absence (2022) explores what absence is or is not. Poet Morgan Parker has said “Absence implies a memory of what once took place.” Did it or not? Memory expands and contracts, creates new images in our minds, allows old images to stay with us and emerge in a broader spectrum. In a recent lecture at the Academy of American Poets, Jane Hirshfield spoke extensively about absence as “making the invisible visible” and said “Absence—needs no explanation.” The poems in The Geography of Absence all explore different aspects of absence without using the word. Only in the title, which is the last line of one poem, is the word used.

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published by Mercury Heartlink Press

interview by SouthWest Writers