WGA Member Books 2025

Poetry and photography

The Beauty of Vultures is an innovative collection that takes readers into the surprisingly chatty world of birds, whose avian artistry and poignant plumage mimics the formally and structurally inventive tones found in each poem. The language wings its way between funny and serious, poignant and morbid, while always drawing parallels between the poets thoughts and the cameras eye. From peahens telling off their elaborately festooned romantic partners, robins empty eggs recalling air raid tests after WWII, to seagulls serving as harbingers of humanity’s ongoing crimes against nature, each unit of photography melds seamlessly with its poetic doppelgänger.

This poetry collection is inspired by and includes the bird and wildlife photography of Danny Miles-solo Hip Hop artist and recording engineer and drummer for the band July Talk. But this collaborative project is more than call-and-response ekphrastic poems. I let Danny’s photographs guide me to places beyond mere description. I saw multiple connections–to other genres, artists, and poets. I experimented with form I felt was often suggested by a photograph–sonnet, pantoum, acrostic, ghazal, concrete poem, incantation, and even a mini-play. The photographs in the collection evocatively demonstrate Danny’s talent in an artform outside his music.