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Poetry Reading: Bloodroom by Kay E. Bancroft
Featured Book
Bloodroom
"Do you identify with any of the above terminology? Occasionally. Some days they feel appropriate. Others, I resent these tools of our language. I reject and embrace, synchronously." Bloodroom is a howling, scorching debut collection of deftly formatted poetry-circling, and delicately probing, themes of familial debt, legacy, obligation, and the matriline. Through an index of past wounds and inherited scars, the speaker bleeds their histories together with the slow erosion of nostalgia. These poems offer an incisive and scalding interrogation of gender, yet are often unbearably tender-a swirling emulsion of grief and anger poured into an intricately technical and beautifully challenging mold. Each piece draws out a tragic, cyclical song of love and loss, resentment and admiration, as though drawing poison from a wound. Bancroft's writing is meditative, cleansing, and compulsively readable: recounting a feminine childhood transformed into something monstrous until seen through a new lens. Bloodroom is a plea to identity, to the process of searching for purpose and of seeking certainty in a broken world.
This book will be available for purchase at the event.
About This Event
Poetry Reading: Bloodroom by Kay E. Bancroft Please join us on Friday, June 26th to celebrate the debut poetry collection Bloodroom by Kay E. Bancroft. The author will be reading with Séamus Isaac Fey and I.S. Jones.
Featured Author
Kay E. Bancroft
Kay E. Bancroft is a writer, educator, and artist based in Cincinnati, OH. They hold an MFA in Poetry from Randolph College, and a BA from the University of Cincinnati. Their debut poetry collection, Bloodroom, is forthcoming from Sundress Publications in Summer 2026. You can find their writing in Poet Lore, Pleiades Journal, RHINO Poetry, Passengers Journal, The Rumpus, & more. Explore more at kayebancroftpoet.com
About the Venue
Women & Children First
Women & Children First believes in the transformative power of literature. As intersectional trans-inclusive feminists, we believe books are tools for liberation. Since 1979, we have celebrated and amplified underrepresented voices.
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