Master Suffering

This book is full of the questions and uncomfortable uncertainties that grief and the body bring; it is also full of speakers who are determined, and then unsure. The female bodies of Master Suffering want power to survive; they want to control and to correct the suffering they witness and withstand. But wanting can lead to suffering, too, and make speakers like Burroughs ask: “Why / should I have wanted so much / as to threaten my being?”

CM Burroughs is Associate Professor of Poetry at Columbia College Chicago. She is the author of two collections: THE VITAL SYSTEM (Tupelo Press, 2012) and MASTER SUFFERING (Tupelo Press, 2020.) Burroughs has been awarded fellowships and grants from Yaddo, the MacDowell Colony, Djerassi Foundation, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Cave Canem Foundation. She has received commissions from the Studio Museum of Harlem and the Warhol Museum to create poetry in response to art installations. Burroughs' poetry has appeared in journals and anthologies including Poetry magazine, Callaloo, jubilat, Ploughshares, VOLT, Best American Experimental Writing Anthology, and The Golden Shovel Anthology: New Poems Honoring Gwendolyn Brooks. Burroughs has been a featured reader and has given poetry lectures and writing workshops at institutions and reading series across America and internationally.