Preview: Carolyn Forché tells how Margaret Atwood and the Mt. St. Helens eruption conspired to reshape her poetry career

Even before Carolyn Forché published her breakthrough poetry collection The Country Between Us, the book caused controversy. Featuring stark, sometimes graphic depictions of war-torn El Salvador, where Forché had traveled in the late 1970s, the manuscript seemed destined to remain in a drawer -- until the poet took a fateful all-night car ride with legendary novelist Margaret Atwood. #poetry #poems #elsalvador #margaretatwood #carolynforche #thecountrybetweenus #thehandmaidstale #politicalpoetry #oscarromero