Work samples

  • Poem: Ode to My Son's First Shooter Drill
    This poem uses an archaic form to grapple with a contemporary issue-- parenting in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre. "Ode to My Son's First Shooter Drill" appeared in the Summer 2017 issue of WAXWING.
  • On Watching the Election Results Come In
    "On Watching the Election Results Come In," written as a way to theorize resistance post-election, appears in the Fall 2017 issue of ARKANSAS INTERNATIONAL.
  • Guinvere in Baltimore Poems.pdf
    "Waiting Out an Election," a sample poem from my previous book, GUINEVERE IN BALTIMORE (Waywiser 2013)

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About Shelley

Shelley Puhak is a writer who was born and raised in Maryland. The city of Baltimore figures prominently in Puhak's poems and essays, as both subject matter and image. 

Puhak's essays have appeared in The Atlantic, Creative Nonfiction, The Iowa Review, and Salon, been given Notable mentions in Best American Essays 2016 & 2017, and been reprinted in Best American Travel Writing 2017. Puhak is also the author of two poetry collections, the more… more
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Guinevere in Baltimore

GUINEVERE IN BALTIMORE was selected by former Poet Laureate Charles Simic for the 8th annual Anthony Hecht Prize. The collection has received lots of hometown love, including great reviews in CityPaper and jmww, an article in Baltimore Magazine, and the title of Best Poet in City Paper’s 2014 “Best of Baltimore.” The collection transports the classic Arthurian love triangle to contemporary Baltimore. Guinevere and Lancelot navigate their doomed affair against a backdrop of Baltimore landmarks: Fort McHenry, the Bromo Seltzer Tower, Walters Art Musuem, and Fells Point wharves. The pair examine love in all of its chemical, biological, political, and technological dimensions, ultimately asking readers to examine our own infidelities to our ideals.


  • Guinevere in Baltimore, cover
    Guinevere in Baltimore, cover
    The Waywiser Press, 2013
  • Guinevere in Baltimore Foreward
    Foreward to the collection written by Charles Simic, judge for the 8th annual Anthony Hecht Prize.
  • Guinevere in Baltimore: excerpt 1
    3 poems
  • Guinevere in Baltimore: excerpt 2
    3 poems

    • Stalin in Aruba

    Puhak's first poetry book, Stalin in Aruba, is a hybrid of poetry and historical fiction inhabited by dictators and daughters, Politburo wives and Nazi mistresses. By drawing upon a wealth of personal artifacts left behind by Stalin’s inner circle and combining meticulous research and imaginative truths, Stalin in Aruba explores how we resist and how we succumb to the banality of evil.

    Stalin in Aruba was awarded the 2010 Towson Prize for Literature.
    • Stalin in Aruba cover
      Stalin in Aruba cover
      Black Lawrence Press, 2009
    • excerpts from Stalin in Aruba
      Two poems: 1) Stalin in Aruba 2) The Führer’s Girls
    • TU Prize for Literature 2010
      Press release describing STALIN IN ARUBA's selection for the Towson Prize for Literature