In celebration of National Poetry Month, we are delighted to share excerpts from two recent titles from Tupelo Press, a noted literary publisher of poetry and prose: Other Paths for Shahrazad, edited by Jennifer Jean, and The Book of Marys and Glaciers by Carrie Olivia Adams. Tupelo Press is distributed by the University of Chicago Press.

Published in February 2026, Other Paths for Shahrazad is an Arabic/English anthology of contemporary poetry by Arab women, a project of the Her Story Is collective led by Iraqi and American women writers and artists.

“Let Us—Together”

by Hanaa Ahmed Jabr of Iraq, co-translated by Dima AlBasha and Jennifer Jean

—share the forbidden homeland

as our dreams are crucified on barbed fences,

on TV, & by novelists—

as our graves rush toward us . . .

Let us—together

—laugh like two kids with pockets full

of uninflated balloons & cartoon scribbles—

the souvenirs of holidays that last

as long as the dream lasts . . .

Let us—together

—dream of swinging on a crescent

moon, of living in a moment

where we ignore the statues of liberty . . .

Let us—together

—pretend we’re surprised

Iraq has abandoned a schoolbook geography . . .

Let us—together

—adorn ourselves with a date palm smile

so that maybe (maybe!) we’re surprised one day

when this country holds us close—

let us taste—together

—its loaf of tenderness,

its barrel of buttermilk.

Published in April 2026, The Book of Marys and Glaciers by Carrie Olivia Adams collects three sequences of poems engaging with deserts, consumerism, Alaskan ice, religious icons, and more.

VI.

I wanted to write about Mary, but then I became distracted by the glaciers. The

things that glaciers do. The angels too loud, too surveillant. The glaciers, always

alone, even when we were so close, reaching our hands off the bow to scoop the

ice. They were at a remove. Unable to be fathomed. Austere and foreboding and

vulnerable and slowly calving with a roar or a sigh. The weight of it all; the abuse

of it all. I made myself tall enough to get in the frame with the glacier. On my

toes, I was here. I came to watch the earth crumble and slowly slide against itself.

This is work, this labor, the cracks of something so large it can only break.

Both books are available now from our website. Use the code UCPNEW to save 30% when you order from us directly.