Poet Lucia Perillo died on October 16. Though the cause has not been stated, she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1988. She was fifty-eight.

Perillo was the author of seven books of poetry, the most recent of which, Time Will Clean the Carcass Bones: Selected and New Poems, was published this past February by Copper Canyon Press. Her books earned her several awards: The Norma Farber first book award, the Kate Tufts prize, the Kingsley Tufts prize, and the Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt Prize from the Library of Congress for Inseminating the Elephant (also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize). She also wrote a collection of essays and a book of short stories.

She earned a MacArthur Foundation grant in 2000, and the foundation said of her collection, The Oldest Map with the Name America (1999), that it “synthesizes seemingly disparate elements of classical and popular culture to create a work that is both personal and universal. In this intellectually inventive volume, she maintains the intensity of lyric poetry while using free verse and a long-line narrative structure to present emotionally rich and powerful poems.”

Perillo worked for the Fish & Wildlife Service before turning to teaching, first at Saint Martin’s College, then at Southern Illinois University, the Warren Wilson College MFA program, and Syracuse University. In 2014, she was a featured presenter at AWP’s Conference & Bookfair in Seattle.

The Library of Congress has available a webcast of her reading along with Tony Hoagland in 2009.

Photo Credit: AWP/Robb Cohen Photography