Michelle Y. Burke is a poet, professor, mother, and environmentalist. She is the author of the poetry collection Animal Purpose, winner of the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize. Her poetry has appeared in Poetry, Hopkins Review, Lake Effect, and other publications. She’s received poetry prizes from the Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Memorial Fund, the Cultural Center of Cape Cod, and the American Literary Review, and fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center. Her poetry has been featured on The Writer’s Almanac, American Life in Poetry, Best of the Net, and Poetry Out Loud.
She teaches writing and humanities courses at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ, and has worked on small farms throughout the Midwest and Northeast. She lives in New York City with her husband, the writer Douglas Watson, and their two children. You will not find her on social media, but you will find her walking in the woods with her family.
Headshot credit: Charles Chessler Photography