Emerging BIWOC Poet Spotlight: Lisa Low

This monthly series features poems by women of color in the early stages of their publishing careers. It is our intention to create more space at Perugia for the work of poets who are Black, Indigenous, and women of color (BIWOC). We hope using our platform to highlight this work will expand the readership of the poets we spotlight. This series aligns with Perugia’s mission to celebrate and support emerging women poets, inclusive of gender-expansive identities; featured poems will be from poets with no more than one published full-length collection. We’d love to hear from readers with suggestions for poems & poets to feature.

March 2026 Poet: Lisa Low

Ars Poetica

For years I used the body
of my younger self as proof
racism exists. I placed her 
into the blank space
of a poem as if no one
would see her. She let me
arrange her like that— 
sitting on her hands, 
thighs suctioned 
to a folding chair.
What audience doesn't
want to see a girl 
sweat? She glistened
like evidence, shone
from all angles. I wouldn't 
let her friends into
the poem. I left a box 
of tissues outside the frame.
I gave her the open 
ceiling of a poem through 
which she could be looked at 
as long as you want.

Source

Replica, University of Wisconsin Press, 2026

Poet Bio

Lisa Low is the author of Replica (University of Wisconsin Press, 2026) and the chapbook Crown for the Girl Inside (YesYes Books, 2023). She is the recipient of a 2023 Pushcart Prize and the 2020 Gulf Coast Nonfiction Prize, and her poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Ecotone, The Massachusetts Review, Poetry, The Southern Review, and elsewhere. Originally from Maryland, she lives in Chicago.

To learn more about Lisa Low, visit her website.