She Who is Like a Mare: Poems of Mary Breckinridge and the Frontier Nursing Service

The skillfully rendered dramatic monologues of Karen Kotrba�s SHE WHO IS LIKE A MARE document the Remarkable history of the Frontier Nursing Service in eastern Kentucky in the early twentieth century. Through the imagined voices of the founder, Mary Breckinridge, and the nurse-midwives she trained to travel the back roads of Kentucky on horseback, Kotrba

brings a whole community to life. With a sure command of the multiple tones and mixed dictions of the region, she gives voice to a wide range of characters: the local citizens who are protective of their mountain women who have always �birthed the babies�; the physicians who want to replace

any kind of midwifery with the new medical field of obstetrics; the fathers who ride out in fierce storms to bring help to their wives in labor; and the

mothers, the children, and even one amazing poem in the voice of a horse.

With this book, Karen Kotrba joins the company of our great documentary poets: Stephen Vincent Benet, Carl Sandburg, the Muriel Rukeyser of U.S. 1, and West Virginia poet Louise McNeill. She has brought to light a little known piece of women�s history�a story of cunning, courage, and caring�and has done so with unforgettable imagery, beautiful music, and love. This is a book I want to keep near me and reread, to remind myself of what is still possible in poetry and in our lives. --Maggie Anderson

Karen Kotrba was raised in Columbiana, Ohio, where her interest in nursing history was sparked by her mother�s career in nursing.

An award winning writer of short fiction and essays, she graduated from the Northeast Ohio MFA program and teaches composition at Youngstown State University. She lives in Columbiana County and is

currently working on a series of short stories set in East Liverpool, Ohio. Karen has led writing workshops at the Cleveland Clinic and various community settings.