Lighting the Shadow is about a woman’s evolving journey through desire, grief, trauma, and the peculiar historical American psyche of desire and violence. These poems explore the international and psychological wars women survive—wars inflicted through various mediums that employ art, race, and literature. Furthermore, the collection is about a woman’s transformation and acceptance of her complicated attempts to balance her spirit’s own spectrum. Pulling the poet away from death, these poems insist that she open her life to her own powers and the powers of a greater world—a world that is both bright and dark.

RACHEL ELIZA GRIFFITHS is a poet and visual artist. She is the author of three collections of poetry including Mule & Pear (New Issues Poetry & Prose), which was selected for the 2012 Inaugural Poetry Award by the Black Caucus of the American Library Association. She teaches creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Brooklyn.