The Hungriest Stars
Carey Salerno

With language flush with and supercharged by Eros, Carey Salerno's third book is a poet’s elegy to her uterus, her love letter penned in an overcrowded room to autonomy and desire. Having been debilitated and rendered infertile by endometriosis, endured rounds of infertility treatments that landed her in miscarriage and selective reduction treatments, and suffered a cancer scare that left her body incapable of conceiving, Carey Salerno responds with these maximalist poems. Through them, she dives headfirst into the world with an intense hunger to live to the fullest, to release the shame the she has amassed about her own body and its refusals to function, reflecting on and redefining what it means to be a woman when so much is taken from her. 

“The Hungriest Stars finds epic ambition in deadly flower arrangments, domestic life revealing its mythos, and Plutonian astrology culling death and light to configure its own future. In this collection, shadows writhe with verdancy, petals from a paradise that cannot be trusted and promises that fail.”
—Phillip B. Williams

Carey Salerno is the author of two previous books of poetry, Tributary, and Shelter. Her poems have appeared widely in American Poetry Review, Poetry,  Harvard Review, and elsewhere. She is the Executive Director and Publisher of Alice James Books.

Paperback / $19.00 (Can. $25.00) / ISBN 978-0-89255-630-4 / 128 pages / Poetry