Publications
Taking Her Back
(Atmosphere Press, 2021)
Full-Length Poetry Collection
A ship is a paradox, both home and grave, wood and water, forward-venturing and anchor to the past: like magic and miracle, it transforms all who sail aboard her in ways unspeakable.
In 2014, Cristina J. Baptista was one of 85 people selected to sail aboard the world’s last remaining wooden whaleship, the 1841 vessel Charles W. Morgan. The result of this 38th Voyage of the Morgan is Taking Her Back, a poetry collection that gives voice to the immigrant experience, particularly those of the Portuguese figures once called by anthropologists the “invisible minority.” Combining historical records, news reports, literary allusions, myths, and personal experience, Taking Her Back reclaims the lost voices of the thousands of whalemen—often illiterate, mostly diminished—who kept so much of the world afloat.
Ultimately, these poems illuminate, as sun reflecting upon the sea, the depths of a human history and the roots of a forgotten American past. Like lines of rigging linking parts of a ship, the poems in Taking Her Back connect the past, present, and possible future through a lens of antiquity and personal nostalgia—and a haunting space between them.
Taking Her Back
Finalist: 2022 Connecticut Book Award, “Poetry” Category
The Drowning Book
(Finishing Line Press, 2017)
Full-Length Poetry Collection
“A book of family, of daughters and mothers, of fathers and brothers, and, especially, of women defying and defiant, Cristina Baptista’s The Drowning Book compels us to consider the fragility and resilience of human experience. Singularly voiced, these poems reckon with a world where “everything is a surface preparing / to break, a first time,” and they go on to hope that, “in all breaking, something must grow.” For all the devastation Baptista conjures and confronts in these poems, she also testifies to that which makes “each of us an heir to Icarus / falling as we dream // dreaming as we fall.” Call it a fortunate fate that we might immerse ourselves in these poems: The Drowning Book is a marvelous debut.”
–Jordan Windholz, author of Other Psalms (2015, University of North Texas Press; 2014 Vassar Miller Prize in Poetry Winner)
“Cristina Baptista‘s poems ripple with the most beautiful and haunting particulars. Her poems move through the world with clarity and compassion, showing us the universal joys and pains of being a human being in this raging century. The Drowning Book is a marvelous poetic achievement.”
–Todd Colby, author of Splash State (2014, The Song Cave)
Signed Copies
I am happy to sign and/or personalize copies of The Drowning Book and/or Taking Her Back, upon request. Simply contact me using the form on the Home page of this site (scroll to the bottom of that page). Copies of The Drowning Book are $20 and Taking Her Back are $18, payable through PayPal, and I the price is to cover shipping and packaging costs (within the United States only). For those outside the United States still interested in signed copies, feel free to contact me as well.
Otherwise, you can order copies of The Drowning Book and Taking Her Back at the links above.
Reviews left on FLP’s site and/or Amazon and/or Goodreads is much appreciated as well. Thank you!
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Other Publications
Poetry
• “Before the Accident,” Helix Literary Magazine (Fall 2023)
• “What a Bird Knows,” Connecticut Bards Poetry Review 2023 (2023), via Local Gems Press
• “Breath” and “The Annunciation,” Nimrod International Journal, Spring/Summer 2022
• “Curing Beasts,” 2021 Key West Art & Historical Society’s Tennessee Williams Poetry Contest, 2nd Place Winner
• “Pomology,” The 2020 Hackney Literary Awards, First-place in Poetry, 2020-21; published also in Birmingham Arts Journal, vol. 17, issue 4, Summer 2021
• “The Women” and “On The Spiral Road,” Passengers Journal, vol. 1, issue 5, November 2020
• “[My soft eager rising],” Frontier Poetry, Snap Poetry Contest (Instagram). First place winner, September 2020
• “Pandemic Poem #55.” The Poetry Society of New York, Spring 2020; co-written with Adeena Karasick
• “Timing,” Construction Literary Magazine, Fall 2019
• “The Broken,” Structo Magazine, issue 18, Fall 2017
• “Transformation,” 3Elements Literary Review, issue 13, Winter 2017; Also nominated for a Best of the Net, 2017 Award
• “Psalm of Fire and Water,” WAVES: A Confluence of Women’s Voices (A Room of Her Own Foundation) [Table of Contents]
• “Hesitating Fractions,” New Millennium Writings, The 25th Anthology; “Evolve” Issue. Honorable Mention in the New Millenniums Writings Poetry Contest, Winter 2016
• “Kestrels,” Structo Magazine, issue 16, 2016; First-prize winner of the Psalm Contest.
• “Monster,” Painted Bride Quarterly—“Monster” issue, Issue 95, 2016 / 2017; audio included. Also discussed on PBQ’s Slush Pile podcast, Episode 2
• “Homesickness” and “Eavesdroppers,” Meniscus, vol. 4, issue 1—“Beyond the Divide” issue, April / May 2016
• “Creature of No Consequence,” Two Cities Review, April 6, 2016ff.; audio included
• “Workers,” Naugatuck River Review, issue 15, Winter/Spring 2016; Finalist in the 7th Annual Narrative Poetry Contest
• “Mother Maguey,” ADANNA Literary Journal: Women and Spirituality Edition, Fall 2015
• “Eleven,” Right Hand Pointing, “Issue 91: Imaginary Numbers,” October 2015; Nominated for Best of the Net (2015-16)
• “Genuflecting” and “Trouble Woman,” Structo Magazine, issue 14, August 2015; The Forward Prize in the Best Single Poem category
• “Weather of Weapons,” The Wayfarer, vol. 3, issue 3, Fall 2014; Purchase HERE
•”Lover, Heal Thyself” and “The Sweetest Fig” and “Waiting in a Bronx Apartment,” Academy of American Poets Prizes/Fordham University, Prizes Edition and The Fordham Observer, April 2012.
• “Cadaver Dogs,” Opium Magazine’s Contest Edition, Spring 2010
• “Remaining (Hand over Fist),” CURA: A Literary Magazine of Art & Action, issue 1., Fall 2011; in print Spring 2012
• “Coelhos,” The Ledge Poetry & Fiction Magazine, issue 33, Spring 2011
• “Among Them,” Poem of the Month. Fordham University Creative Writing Program Monthly Newsletter, May 2011
• “The Fury Fused,” Fordham Notes (Fordham University), April 8, 2011; “National Poetry Month: Featured Poem of the Day”
• “Being Done Wrong,” NEBO: A Literary Journal, vol. 29, no. 1, Fall 2010
• “Asthmatic,” DASH Literary Journal, issue no. 3, Spring 2010
• “A Story That Almost Happened,” The Cortland Review, issue 45, November 2009; audio included
• “Entering War,” Oranges & Sardines, vol. 2, issue 7, November / Fall 2009; Featured author profile / essay
• “The Head and Neck Cancer Book,” Shakespeare’s Monkey Revue, vol. 2, issue 3, 2009, “The Body” Theme
• “Out of Many, One,” Phi Kappa Phi Forum, Summer 2009; Runner-up, “America” theme issue
• “Soap and Seeds,” The Baltimore Review, vol. 13, number 1, Winter/Spring 2009; First Prize Winner, The Baltimore Review’s 2008 Poetry Competition
• “The Old Country,” California Quarterly, vol. 34, number 3, 2008
• “Because indigestion only happens after dinner,” MARGIE, The American Journal of Poetry, vol. 7, 2008
• “When You Were Here Last,” The Swarthmore Literary Review, issue 1, May 2008
• “The End of Days,” Eight Octaves Magazine, issue 1.5, May 2008
• “Going Away (Torres Novas)”; “The Flight Overseas”; and “The Cabin,” Hobble Creek Review, Issue 2, Vol. 2, May 2008
• “wilderness,” Paradigm (Journal of Rain Farm Press), April 2008, Issue 6, “The Elliott Issue”
• “On the Subway Train” and “The Pedestal Sink,” Mannequin Envy, Winter 2008
•“The Bird Beneath the Bush,” No, Dear Magazine, Spring 2008, issue 1
• “Cloudburst,” Horizons Literary Magazine, Spring 2005 vol. 22
Forthcoming Poems
• “Reading Texts” and “Collateral,” Parts of the Whole: Poetry of the Body Anthology
• “Reuniting with a Stranger, Once Someone I Loved,” Chroma (The Red Issue)
• “Possessors,” The List Anthology
Fiction
• “Small Destines,” Dogwood: A Journal of Poetry and Prose, Spring 2021, issue 20, Finalist for the Fiction Literary Award
• “Twisted Branches,” Horizons Literary Magazine, Spring 2004, vol. 21
• “A Time Passed,” Horizons Literary Magazine, Spring 2003, vol. 20
Memoir / Personal-Essay / Non-Fiction
• “My B’Way Story Winner: Cristina Baptista,” Broadway Inbound, The Broadway Collection, January 2017
• “Breathing Through (Joigny, France),” Immersion Journals, April 2016
• “The Wrapping Paper,” The Santa Claus Project: Stories of Discovery About a Man in a Red Suit. Edited by Marsha Schmidt. AuthorHouse, 2012.
Book Reviews
• “Review: A Provisional Map of the Lost Continent (2016, Fordham University Press) by Gregory Mahrer,” The Collagist, September 2016
• “Letting and Letting Go: Mask for Mask by JD Scott (New Rivers Press),” Michigan Quarterly Review, June 2021
Other
• Contributor, Prayers From the Heart: The Sacred Heart University Prayerbook. Ed. Patricia Leonard Pasley. Fairfield, CT, Sacred Heart UP, 2002.