“Hi. I’m Amba, and I’m a poet.
I have been a closet poet my entire life. While I was writing poetry I was also experiencing life. I survived childhood and went to college. Got married and divorced. Had children. Had other relationships some I probably shouldn’t have. Worked for a “large corporation” most of my life only to have them lay me off at the age of 50 – so I went back to school and became a massage therapist and started over again. But this time starting over I had a wonderful husband who has always known I was a closet writer. And he also told me one day I would write a book. So all those years of writing about all the experiences life has given me is here, and this is my coming out of the closet.
I am Amba and I am a poet.
There is one other person that I need to mention in this closet coming out, though. I believe that sometimes there are humans that are angels that visit us, messengers. I had one of those right before I was laid off, and my life totally changed and I completely redefined my world. I worked with him at the “large corporation” I mentioned. He was a young guy who was fresh out of college. We had one of those strange undefinable connections. At a holiday 10.00 gift exchange where we drew numbers and got our gift, I got the one from him. He told me that he bought it hoping I would be the one to get it. It was a trigger point massage tool and an old book of poetry by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Poems of Passion from 1883.
I genuinely believe that he was showing me my future. A couple of months after he passed me those gifts, he died. I hope he is watching me come out and knows that I am grateful for his blessings.
So with that… welcome to my poetry. I hope you find something that you enjoy, that helps you heal, that touches you. Through putting this together I realized how much I write to heal. But I also write to celebrate and to remember. And at the end of the day, I think they are all poems of passion. Welcome.
voices
newly released may 2026
Our lives are all about stories, and in Voices, Amba returns to exploring those stories. This collection is in three distinct sections: in the skin, in the dark, in the mind. ‘In the skin’ is about the body. Amba looks at tattoos, scars, and more, as the stories that a person captures in their skin - the stories we choose to show, or hide. She also explores the reasons that people tattoo, or modify their bodies. The way that tattoos can be addictive, their voices a solace to the soul.
‘In the dark’ is intimate poetry - the love stories we live. Much of this poetry describes simple everyday moments in relationships. She captures love that is worn around the edges from life, love that is a second chance, love that is imperfect. The verse in this section can be quiet, and can be raw.
‘In the mind’ explores aging, agency, and the stories we tell ourselves (and sometimes others) in our twilight years. Honest moments Amba has seen others navigating age. It also taps into her own experience of aging. The poetry in this section resonates with both children trying to make hard decisions that affect everyone, and parents coming to terms with the role-reversal aging so often prompts.
in the hills
newly released winter 2025
Amba started visiting Southeastern Ohio twenty-five years ago. Lake Hope and Hocking Hills are where her girls grew up on weekend getaways, day trips, and week long vacations. It was the best thing from a bad relationship. It was a place that soothed her soul. When she first came to the hills, the state parks were sleepy little holes in the wall, places that no one knew about. It stayed that way for a long time. A weekend and you felt like the whole park was there just for you. She fell in love with the landscape, the people, the magic. She decided that she needed to live in the hills among the hemlocks and waterfalls. In this book she pays homage to them all.
If you too love Hocking Hills, you will love this book.
naked & healing
released autumn 2024
This volume is full of the big and small moments that make life beautiful, and heartbreaking, and simple, and complex. Poetry about mundane experiences like having a flat tire, surviving life in a service job, the joys and challenges of parenthood and childhood, and how we cope with change. The thread that touches most of the poems in this collection is relationships. Relationships with our children, our parents, friends, employers, ourselves, our memories, the earth and the world at large. At the end of the day, relationships are what life is about. The experiences we have in life would be vastly different if we had those experiences with different people.
domesticated demons
released 2023
Domesticated Demons is a collection of poetry about moments of anxiety, insecurity, depression, and other triggers and traumas that are familiar to many. In the same style as Amba's premier release, Maiden Mother Crone, the poetry you'll find in this collection is written for real people, about real life - raw, honest, and simple. This book provides a window of understanding, and the healing of knowing you aren’t alone. We all have demons - the trick, is learning to domesticate them.
maiden, mother, crone
released 2022
Maiden, Mother, Crone is a glimpse into the mind of a woman as she contends with her life’s experiences. The book is divided into 3 sections each one a stage of womanhood. Each poem an experience as she moves through these 3 stages of womanhood. Maiden is a young woman trying to find herself, find someone to love, begin to heal herself, understand where she fits in the world. Mother is a blend of motherhood and divorce – they went hand in hand. Crone is the later years in life. Looking back from where she has been and forward to what is left. Throughout she is trying to find peace and acceptance with herself and her world. Somewhere you may recognize pieces of your story too.
poems
Home
Last night I lay in bed sick. Pillows propping me up so I can try to breath. Nose stuffed up and running at the same time. I looked around the room. I am laying in a bed that isn't mine...would never be mine no matter how long I lived here. This is the house where I...
I’m starting a blog
So I am going to do something different in my blog space. When the site was originally created it was one more place to share poetry. But as time has passed I now realize I miss having a home for longer thoughts and writings. So this will now be a space for a more...
Shadows and darkness
Today I woke up to shadows not really surprised the darkness was seeping in last night the darkness is comfortable the weight of it safe pressing everything else out }including the words it is all silent in the darkness then the shadows come they keep me tethered to...