Böcker utgivna av Quillkeepers Press

Talking to Ghosts is the debut chapbook from poet Jon Tobias. This small collection is an act of forgiveness towards people who will never be able to ask for it. This collection tries to make sense of the grief we experience when we lose people who hurt us as much as they loved us. Part love letter to his siblings and peace offering to the broken relationship he had with his parents, Tobias guides us through a landscape of loss, forgiveness and hope.

Lent Words is a collection of poems both personal and universal. Delving into themes of light and dark, grief and gratitude, Moore's poems create a space of beauty and welcome. In this, her inaugural chapbook, she brings readers into a world steeped in nature and contemplation. Moore understands the temporal state of our lives and the language we use to navigate it, These words you use / are on borrow. We will /one day give them back / as our tongues turn / to dust and our / lips ash. The poems demonstrate that it is through the visible and tactile that we access the invisible and find meaning.

Words for Women is a collection of poems about reclaiming language. From the ancient Greeks' Harpy and Medusa to today's Housewife and Drama Queen, words with negative or sexualized connotations have been assigned to women and pejoratively used by people to diminish women and girls. Words for Women takes those terms and, through the sound, rhythm and intent of poems, demonstrates how they have been used and how they can be reclaimed as part of a journey to equity and wholeness.

Arranging Words is Abrams' second chapbook collection. Like her first chapbook, The Poet Who Loves Pythagoras, this book is a series of light-hearted poems that asks the reader to look at the world from a new perspective. These poems approach letters, words, and everyday phrases in a way that pokes fun at the eccentricities of the English language. For example, her poem titled "K Knows How to Hide and Seek" begins with the line "K knocks twice, but we only hear him once," reminds us how often "k" is a silent letter. The poem "Poetry Exercise" plays on the meaning of the word "exercise" with the line "Brain cells stretch, lift your arms, reach for words." Phrases are deconstructed into literal meanings, such as in the poem "Beside Myself" that asks, "Am I myself or the one beside myself?" This collection illuminates the quirks of the English language in a lively, humorous way while demonstrating a love for words themselves.

Purge & Bloom is a narrative reflective of processing growth and being human. Decker's debut poetry chapbook is a powerful balance of light and dark, encompassing all the connotations that come with it in its two carefully garnered sections. While its first section, Purge, holds space for expressing and processing incredibly difficult life experiences, dealing with mental health struggles, love, and relationships, its counterpart, Bloom, contains poems representing growth, renewal, and hope. The pieces are curated so that some of the work from Bloom is a response or rebuttal to its numbered counterpart in Purge, delving further into a world of duality, self-awareness, and the healthy power that notion can wield.

Turning the Corner tells the story of a life that persists, encompassing all the empty space around us. Life that pervades death, through the survivors of those who've passed on. In Lori Ulrich's debut poetry collection, she weaves a story of not only turning the corner, but the pain involved in arriving there. In the crimson day of the impossible, her son's life became immortal, and his spirit transcends this collection. A deeply empathetic exploration of the long path of illness, passing, and survival where Lori's words will take your hand, turning the corner with you.

My West, by Jennifer Fox, is a compendium of memories etched into the landscape she lives in daily. Each poem is a glimpse of transformation, the earth, and the part our souls have to play. Jennifer's debut poetry collection showcases the understanding of how the natural world influences our own growth and how we, in turn, may affect the natural world. This collection is written with elegance and grace, retaining the spirit that spurs the reader through each page.

High Water is the debut chapbook from poet Carrie Carter. An act of poetic world creation told over twenty-three poems, High Water introduces readers to the places, characters, and experiences defining Carter's identity during her first 40 years on our beautiful and complex planet. Weaving a continuous narrative through individual snapshots, Carter constructs a vivid portrait and landscape of a life lived through joy and tears in moments that accumulate with the ebb and flow of the tide. There are stories of ancestral legacy; of how we reconcile our individuality against the needs of our communities; and the many ways grief becomes another layer of the strata of our lives. High Water is a mighty tree standing strong against the changing currents and shifting tectonic plates that form the natural evolution of life. It leaves readers wondering what it means to be alive in linear time, and how we do more than just survive - how do we thrive?

Life's forgotten nooks and crannies are lit by the soft but penetrating light of Gunton's, Notable Moons. His work illuminates these domestic spaces we inhabit as being very strange, fragile, and temporary. In contrast, the natural world is so rich and resilient that even if we damage it to the point where it can no longer support us, it will survive us. Life is vividly portrayed in each of these poems with the insight that only an introspective and thoughtful poet could bring. Whether it is observing the microcosms in our yards, or the primitive nature of modern life, David Gunton places us at a new vantage point, as noted in his poem 'Two Kinds' where "There are two people in this world, and you weren't either one of them." Venture down these paths of domestic spaces and the untamed forces of nature with the pale light of Notable Moons."

AmerAsian, a chapbook-length poetry collection by Kimberly McAfee, takes the reader on a quest to find a balance and peace with being raised as an Asian-American. Follow the journey of a young girl trying to navigate her way through the minefields and misapprehensions of current society and blossoming into an empowered woman who appreciates her duality. McAfee is an avid lover of mythology, and many of the selections in this collection spotlight brilliant Korean folklore while maintaining relatability for all readers, regardless of their cultural background. Coupled with elegant imagery and flow, AmerAsian has a unique way of pulling you into its pages like a magnetic embrace, a perfect reflection of Kimberly herself.