What to Eat, What to Drink, What to Leave for Poison

Camille T. Dungy is the author of Suck on the Marrow (Red Hen Press, 2010), winner of the American Book Award and a Silver Medalist for the California Book Award; and What to Eat, What to Drink, What to Leave for Poison (Red Hen Press, 2006), a finalist for the PEN Center USA 2007 Literary Award and the Library of Virginia 2007 Literary Award. Dungy has received fellowships from organizations including the National Endowment for the Arts, The Virginia Commission for the Arts, Cave Canem, Bread Loaf, the Dana Award, and the American Antiquarian Society. Dungy is Associate Professor in the Creative Writing Department at San Francisco State University. Editor of Black Nature: A Poetry Anthology (University of Georgia Press, 2009), she is co-editor of From the Fishouse: An Anthology of Poems that Sing, Rhyme, Resound, Syncopate, Alliterate, and Just Plain Sound Great (Persea Books, 2009) and assistant editor of Gathering Ground: A Reader Celebrating Cave Canem¿s First Decade (University of Michigan Press, 2006). Her poems have been published widely in anthologies and print and online journals.

"Camille Dungy has a garden of verses that spring up with the sunshine or hide with you in the dusk. "Cleaning" best sums up What to Eat, What to Drink, What to Leave for Poison, an amazing poetry collection, when Dungy pens "understanding clearly/what is fatal to the body./I only understand too late/what can be fatal to the heart." Take an ice tea and sit on the veranda or take a glass of wine and prop up in bed but whatever way you like your poetry, this book is a must."Nikki Giovanni, author of The Collected Poems of Nikki Giovanni and Black Feeling, Black Talk"The sorrow here is ironic and unsentimental and yet Camille Dungy's vision is all joy. Even as anti-psalms, these poems are pure transcendence."Chris Abani, author of GraceLand and Dog Woman"Camille Dungy shares with us in this manuscript her sharp, clear and honest ear and her unswerving commitment to the voice of life. She is a brave poet writing true poems and I salute the music and courage of her work."Lucille Clifton, author of Blessing the Boats and Mercy