The Medicine That Burns

If you read bare roots, you are familiar with the deeply personal nature of my poetry. I pour myself onto the pages in hopes that you no longer feel alone.

This is what happens next.

The Medicine That Burns carries a piece of every one of us inside it. If a breakup nearly broke you, if you live with past pain, if you engage in maladaptive coping to deal with the violence of being human...this book is for you. It is a raw declaration on what a life of trauma can look like after the dust settles and the poems have happy endings. It is an unflinching narrative on how hurt is cyclical, how recovery must be redefined repeatedly, and how shame can poison us in the worst ways.

Heartbreak, addiction, memories, therapy, epiphanies, and on good days, acceptance. That is what I leave here for you. Within these pages I share my poetry, prose, and inner-most thoughts as I navigate the world with mental illness and internal wounds not yet cauterized. It is a song I never thought I would sing, yet slowly and steadily teach myself the tune as I go along. This is not an ordinary poetry book, but my hurt is as ordinary as yours. You may just not know it yet.

Warning: This book contains graphic material that may be triggering to some readers.