Anchored by braided and unstable narratives of young Westerners in India, the poems in Series | India explore the rich borderlands that run between the familiar and the foreign, illumination and opacity, gods and charlatans. In lyrics deeply informed by Gray’s study and experience in India, and formally characterized by shifting and juxtaposed perceptions, perspectives, and voices, we encounter a young couple seeking refuge and enlightenment in a place where the lines between the divine, the human, the gorgeous, the deadly, and the hilarious are often indistinct. How do we make meaning of our encounters with love, death, the divine, the absurd, the horrific? What and how do we actually see? How do we choose? The poems explore these hard questions with compassion, humor, and awe.

ELIZABETH T. GRAY, JR. is a poet, translator of classical and contemporary Persian, and corporate consultant. She has a BA and JD from Harvard University and an MFA from Warren Wilson College.