Books
Burning Like Her Own Planet
Against the backdrop of iconic, ancient Hindu texts, Burning Like Her Own Planet reimagines the lives of Hindu goddesses through a contemporary, feminist lens. Told in a series of persona poems and dramatic monologues, the book reinvents these myths into essential stories of love, betrayal, and faith. In these poems, the goddesses question their predetermined fates and examine what it means to be human and divine. At the heart of the book are the goddesses Sita and Parvati--women who are cast in the role of the "perfect" wife, the "perfect" mother.
The Goddess Monologues
The poems in The Goddess Monologues re-imagine iconic stories central to Hindu mythology. Here, gods and goddesses fight with each other, refuse their destinies and try to understand their complicated relationships with each other. In the world of these poems, goddesses refuse their predetermined fates, gods fall in love with the wrong people and issues of faith are examined with new and critical eyes.
Afternoon Masala
Between Bollywood action stars and aging starlets, vegetable vendors and child brides, the poems in Afternoon Masala describe the struggle of finding a place in the world to call home. Filled with songs, spices and mantras, Afternoon Masala embraces new worlds and old rivers, lost landscapes and love letters. Here both travelers and daughters alike reject their predetermined destinies for the distinct pleasures of a Hindi film, an unruly garden, a long-forgotten language.
Train to Agra
Calling upon two cultures, Train to Agra meditates on the effects of displacement and expatriation on the construction of a young Indian American woman’s identity. The physical journeys undertaken by the speaker reflect her inner journey from immigrant child to Indian American woman, struggling to find her place between India and America, Krishna and Jesus, samosas and hamburgers. Traveling through her reflections on childhood, fate, faith, death, and belonging, she comes to accept her reality as a construct of lived memories and wished-for fantasies.