Heart of a Deer

Pascale Petit's first collection uses startling imagery to journey through Venezuelan Amazon rainforests and the icy realms of Tibet.

Transforming memories of childhood and marriage, she encounters a man changed into a butterfly, a bride who is a frozen waterfall.

At the core of this book are two prize-winning longer poems: Eisriesenwelt, the ice mother, and Kanaima, the forest father -- parents recreated as geology and Amerindian demons, in a landscape of orchids, jaguars, and talking waterfalls.

She is the Poetry Editor of Poetry.