Jill Alexander Essbaum is the author of three full-length collections of poetry: Heaven (2000, University Press of New England), Harlot (2007, No Tell Books), and Necropolis (2008, NeoNuma Arts). Her first book, Heaven, won the 1999 Bakeless Prize in Poetry. Her poems have appeared in many journals including Poetry, The Christian Century, Image, Gulf Coast, and No Tell Motel. A former NEA Literature Fellow, her poem “On Reading Poorly Transcribed Erotica” was included in the anthology The Best American Erotic Poems, 1800-Present. A single-poem chapbook, The Devastation, is now available from Cooper Dillon Books. She lives in Austin, Texas. She read at the  Bloof Books, Cooper Dillon & Noemi Press small press party on Thursday evening at Green Spaces Colorado.

Question 1: What book have you read recently that you absolutely loved?

Yellowrocket: Poems, by Todd Boss. On the surface his poems look harmless, appealing, but they grow and change in unexpected ways, until they become something else, something almost menacing. They’re like cadbury chocolate eggs filled with glass.

Question 2: What’s one piece of advice you wish you had been given when you were just starting out?

Marry up.

Question 3: What is something that can always found in your refrigerator?

Well, not a lot really. I’m a vegan, so no meat. But there is always mustard, sri kanchi sauce, flaxseed, poblano peppers, onions. I love onions. (At this point, Jill starts listing foods faster than they can be written down…)