"Over the years, the poets discovered that, though their voices remain distinct, they do share many things: roots in the Baltimore and East Coast region, a heritage of idealism that is both generational and spiritual, and a healthy dose of both reverence and rebellion. These poems are born of these convergences—and out of the critique and care for each other's work—have become shared creations. In the Margins celebrates resilience, longevity, and the craft that holds them together."

“Like voices in a choir, this beautifully modulated quartet can sing in harmony or rise to the demands of a solo, so that the collection, taken as a whole, is even larger, richer and more resonant than its parts.”
—Elizabeth Spires, Now the Green Blade Rises

My Fortune

If I could have read
a fortune, when I was alone
in my airless New York apartment,
crying over another lost love,
it would have been: One day,
you will drive your teenage
daughter and her friend
through a countryside of corn
and horses and handmade fences
to a church camp for city kids
where they are volunteering, and
you will sing Beatles songs
together and plan a picnic dinner.
I would have found it
hard to believe
that my life would begin,
once I'd left what I thought
was the center of the universe.