Reetika Vazirani was born in India in 1962 and emigrated to the United States with her family as a child. She received her BA from Wellesley College and her MFA from the University of Virginia. Her first collection of poetry, White Elephants, (Beacon Press, 1996) won the Barnard New Women Poets Prize. Her second collection, World Hotel, (Copper Canyon Press, 2002) won the 2003 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award. Vazirani received a Pushcart Prize, a Poets & Writers exchange program award, the Glenna Luchei award from Prairie Schooner, and a “Discovery”/The Nation award. She was writer-in-residence at Sweet Briar College and later at the College of William and Mary in 2002. Vazirani passed away on July 16, 2003. 

These poems are included in Vazirani’s final poetry collection, Radha Says, edited by Leslie McGrath and Ravi Shankar and published by Drunken Boat Media in the fall of 2009.