Aracelis Girmay

Aracelis Girmay (1977- ) born and raised in Santa Ana, California. She received a BA from Connecticut College and went on to earn an MFA in poetry from New York University. She is the author of three collections of poetry: the black maria (BOA Editions, 2016); Kingdom Animalia (BOA Editions, 2011), winner of the 2011 Isabella Gardner Poetry Award and the GLCA New Writers Award. The recipient of fellowships from Cave Canem, Civitella Ranieri, and the National Endowment for the Arts, Girmay is the winner of a 2015 Whiting Award for Poetry. She teaches in Hampshire College’s School for Interdisciplinary Arts and Drew University’s low-residency MFA program in poetry.

Ars Poetica

May the poems be

the little snail's trail.

Everywhere I go,

every inch: quiet record

of the foot’s silver prayer.

I lived once.

Thank you.

I was here. 

— Aracelis Girmay