Skull

SKULL explores themes of harm, trauma, pain, illness, and healing from brain injury sustained in the context of our collective, trying times.

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"Amy Baskin's tight new collection Skull begins with the disorientation of an accident which then moves into its aftermath-the squint-eyed way we navigate a world of dark and light post-trauma, trying to survive what happens to, around, and inside of us. With precise and vivid language to render this imprecision and uncertainty, Baskin's Skull fits the moment in our contemporary world as we all work through collective injury, struggling to focus our eyes."

-Justin Hamm, author of O Death and Drinking Guinness with the Dead

"Amy Baskin's visceral, candid poetry reminds us that personal and societal calamities are inextricably linked. These heartbreaking tales of persistence and self-love, filled with the things of life-parenting, aging, fear, desire-reveal a path toward healing with songs compelling enough to embolden [us] to face the storm."

-Christopher Luna, author of Voracity, Poet Laureate of Clark County, WA (2013-2017)

"In Skull, Amy Baskin explores loss in an unflinching yet uplifting way. While abilities may change, people, time, and places that we lose stay with us. Amy probes the deepest parts of grief and injury, creating a neural pathway of potential through memories, plasticity, and healing. Today's been one of these days, these flatlining days yet I find myself pliant and willing to listen more, learn more, and tell more."

-Kashiana Singh, author of Woman by the Door and Crushed Anthills

Amy Baskin is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee, an Oregon Literary Arts Fellow, and an Oregon Poetry Association prizewinner. Her work can be found in anthologies and journals including the HOCUS Tarot, Pirene's Fountain, Friends Journal, and SWWIM. When not writing, she works for the Departments of English and History at Lewis & Clark College and helps run literary arts programs including Fir Acres Writing Workshop. In addition to SKULL (The Poetry Box, 2024), she is the author of Hysterical Cake (Dancing Girl Press, 2021), Night Hag (Unsolicited Press, 2023).