Rachel Eliza Griffiths

Biography

Rachel Eliza Griffiths is a poet and visual artist. Her work has appeared in publications including the New York Times, the New Yorker, Tin House, American Poetry Review, BAX 2016: Best American Experimental Writing, Lit Hub, Guernica, and many others. Her most recent collection of poetry is Lighting the Shadow (Four Way Books, 2015).

See Work

POETRY / Fall 2018

Seeing the Body

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

She died & I—
In the spring of her blood. I remember
my mother’s first injury. The surprise of unborn
petals curling light, red, around her wrist.

POETRY / Fall 2018

Certified

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

We had to present proof for everything:  
My mother was born 
August 31, 1954. On that day 
inside the womb of a minute 
she burst from another woman’s life, 

POETRY / Fall 2018

Belief

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

I’d come into the room & try to write
a different ending on those anonymous walls. 
There was less time all the time
until time changed. You know what I mean. 

POETRY / Fall 2018

Ars Poetica

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

In the evenings, we watched Jeopardy. 
Wore surgical masks once she got sick.
Before that my mother sent me to the store
for cigarettes all the time. Pack of Salem Lights.

POETRY / Fall 2018

Arch of Hysteria

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

I want my web to hold. I want to repair
what I have made. I was not given the gold hive.
In me seethes the silk of invisible worlds. Spinning
my body inside of hairline emptiness, I project

POETRY / Fall 2018

[Untitled]

By Rachel Eliza Griffiths

There is no title. There is no title. The body is content. The body is window.
The body is container, curtain, chair, grid. Do you see? Bones & shoulders, a spine

Photo by Rachel Eliza Griffiths