A Quiet Death in a Small Red Closet

Reetika Vazirani was born in India in 1962 and immigrated to the United States when she was six years old. After receiving her MFA as a Hoyns Fellow at the University of Virginia, she moved to Trenton, New Jersey, where she lived with her son, also the child of poet Yusef Komunyakaa. In 2003, she took her own life and the life of her son. Vazirani published two collections of poetry during her lifetime, and the posthumous Radha Says was released in 2009 by Drunken Boat Media. (updated 6/2010)