Jill Peláez Baumgaertner: "Uprooted"

The VPR Poem of the Week is Jill Peláez Baumgaertner’s “Uprooted,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2001-2002 issue (Volume III, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Jill Peláez Baumgaertner is the author of Finding Cuba (Chimney Hill Press, 2001), a collection of poems that explored her Cuban ancestry, and three poetry chapbooks: Leaving Eden (White Eagle Coffee Store Press, 1995), Namings (Franciscan University Press, 1999), and My Father’s Bones (Finishing Line Press, 2006). She also has edited a textbook, Poetry (Harcourt Brace, 1990), and has written a book of criticism, Flannery O’Connor: A Proper Scaring (Cornerstone Press, 1998).

She has been a winner of the White Eagle Coffee Store Press’s poetry chapbook contest, the Goodman Award, an Illinois Arts Council Award, the Illinois Prize of the Rock River Poetry Contest, and the CCL Midwest Poetry Contest. Additionally, she was a Fulbright fellow to Spain. Jill Peláez Baumgaertner serves as poetry editor of The Christian Century and is a past president of the Conference on Christianity and Literature. She is Professor of English and Dean of Humanities at Wheaton College.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an exceptional work by a poet selected from the archives of Valparaiso Poetry Review with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.