Elegy for Your Eyes

“Elegy for Your Eyes” explores the roles that violence and hunger play in the narrative of female sexuality. Anna Goodson’s work presents an alternate mythology in which Atlas bears plums on his back and where the paintings of Francisco Goya bleed into everyday life. Her poems are both gritty and deeply rooted in the natural world—a world where worms are raptured, girls turn to cows, and trees bloom with birds. The collection is the 2016 winner of the National Federation of State Poetry Societies Edna Meudt Award.