Walking into Lightning explores the dying of the poet’s husband of ALS in 2014, and the first years of widowhood. With profound sensuality and intense imagery, these poems speak of the physicality of love and loss, and the whole territory of grieving: its violence and its ordinariness, the interplay of memory, desire, and sorrow. An extraordinary book for those dealing with loss. Local musician Sara Snyder will respond to some of the poems with songs. Sara has offered community sing-a-longs at the Sunderland Library and other local venues.

Ellen LaFlèche is the author of three chapbooks: Workers’ Rites (Providence Athenaeum, 2011), Ovarian (Dallas Poets Community Press, 2011), and Beatrice (Tiger’s Eye Press, 2013). She has published in diverse journals and websites, including Hunger Mountain, The Ledge, Many Mountains Moving, Mudfish, Harpur Palate, Spoon River Poetry Review, and Naugatuck River Review. She is a recipient of the Ruth Stone Poetry Prize, the Tor House Poetry Prize, the Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Prize, the Philbrick Poetry Award, New Millennium Writings Poetry Award, and the Poets on Parnassus Prize for poetry about the medical experience, among others. She lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, and is an assistant judge of the North Street Book Prize at Winningwriters.com.

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