In poems as beautiful in their telling as they are powerful in their ethos, poet and memoirist Hedge Coke draws upon her background as a tobacco sharecropper, factory worker and fisherwoman, articulating the stark contrast between a tradition of labor that instills pride and builds strong communities with the modern-day reality of backbreaking work that fails to provide sustenance for the land or its people.

Allison Adelle Hedge Coke, of Huron, Tsa la gi, French Canadian and European descent, is the author of the American Book Award-winning debut collection Dog Road Woman and the memoir Rock, Ghost, Willow Deer. She has been instrumental in creating Native American mentorship programs throughout the country and will join the faculty of Northern Michigan University in 2005.