Grateful acknowledgment is made to the editors and staff of the publications in which the following poems first appeared, often in different versions and with different titles:
Anti-: “National Anthem” and “Spirit Arithmetic”
Barrow Street: “Meteorology Index”
Bat City Review: “Ghost Story, 1848”
Boston Review: “The Mosquito Monocracy”
CutBank: “Ghost of General Electric,” “Haunted House, 1978,” “Index of Haunted Houses”
Grist: A Journal for Writers: “Haunted House, 1692”
The Laurel Review: “Border Song,” “Ghost of NASA,” “Ghost Story, 2020,” “A House Unfit Even for Ghosts,” “Interstate Dusk,” “Roswell, 1947”
Oxford Poetry: “Spirit of Black Tuesday”
POOL: “The Body of New Jersey, 1980,” “Eastern Standard Time, 1890,” “Extinction Days, 1873,” “Fever Land, 1499”
Sixth Finch: “Ghost of Motel 6” and “Ghosts of the Bell System”
SLICE: “Nebraskan Bribes” and “Pacific Americana”
The Southern Review: “Ghost Union” and “Haunted City, 1967”
Western Humanities Review: “Ghost of Polaroid”
“The Bell System” and “Manifest Destiny” were selected by Eduardo C. Corral for the Poetry Society of America’s 2016 George Bogin Memorial Award. My thanks to both that esteemed poet and that invaluable institution for that honor.
I would not be a poet without the encouragement and support of teachers, and I’m indebted to the foresight and generosity of Priscilla Becker, Lucie Brock-Broido, Timothy Donnelly, Richard Howard, Patricia Russell, Maurya Simon, and Connie Voisine. If not for Patricia Russell asking me to read my poem aloud in the eleventh grade, or Maurya Simon encouraging me to forget Club Med and apply to graduate programs, or Richard Howard calling me with the news that would spirit me from the Inland Empire to New York City, who knows where I’d be now?
My deepest thanks to Jericho Brown, Victoria Chang, Diana Marie Delgado, Hayley Heaton, Ilya Kaminsky, and Lytton Smith, who made this book what it is through their visions and revisions. My thanks, too, to the Colrain Poetry Manuscript Conference, Hacienda Serena, and Vermont Studio Center, where important work was done.
Thank you to my colleagues at The Bishop’s School, particularly those in the English Department, who kept and keep the promise of letters alive in me. Also, to my students, whose curiosity demands my own, thank you.
Love and appreciation to my parents—who always encouraged me to dream—to my brother and sister—who kept me grounded (often in both senses)—to my friends—who know their own degrees—and to Lauren for her support and for giving me the greatest gifts in my life, Niamh and Maeve, whose creativity and delight humble and hearten me daily.
Finally, thank you to Sarabande and all those there who helped put this book into print. In particular, everlasting appreciation to Sarah Gorham, editor extraordinaire, and Jeffrey Skinner for plucking this needle from the proverbial haystack—your belief renews my own. Thank you for your vision of what poetry can be and your commitment to realizing that vision with every book you publish.