Vidyā: Old Time Love Song Magic

This collection holds new translations of the 33 poems by Vidyā. She is the earliest woman poet who wrote in Sanskrit, and the finest. A scholar once called her “the Sappho of India,” which accurately catches her place at the head of the tradition, and how little is actually known of her. I have been translating her poetry for many years; the 33 poems are all in new translations, and for each poem I have added a small essay, which includes previous translations I have made. The small commentaries talk about the tradition, Vidyā’s language (often unconventional and subversive, mixing vocabularies of love, death, religion, natural history).

Other recent books are a volume of poetry Forests, Temples, Glacial Rivers (Empty Bowl Press, 2025) with collage cover by Hannah Devereux, a London based photographer and artist; and a reissue or third edition of Songs of Mirabai (White Pine Press, 2024) with a fine cover illustration by Mayumi Oda who has taught in the past at Naropa as a Dharma Arts specialist.