The Rooted and Recurrent
By Gina Ferrara
Available September 29, 2026
About the Book
Set in a precarious landscape—lush, tropical but geographically vulnerable to threats of natural disaster—The Rooted and Recurrent reflectively and often lyrically explores the self, family history, and existing and encroaching challenges where the personal and political are fused together.
Written during a formidable time when the country experienced political upheaval, a horrific pandemic, and individual isolation, the poems are rooted in an acute sense of place, complete with live oaks, sweet olive, and satsumas that not only tell us where and when, but more importantly forge an identity by recounting memories that are powerful and generative. The poems in the collection have recurrent themes of family, loss, and change, both personal and environmental. Ultimately, they aim to make personal connections and invite the reader to become emotionally tethered.
About the Author
Gina Ferrara lives in New Orleans. The Rooted and Recurrent is her sixth poetry collection. Her work has appeared in numerous anthologies and journals, including The Southern Review and The Poetry Ireland Review In 2025, she was appointed poet laureate of Louisiana.
Praise for The Rooted and Recurrent
“In The Rooted and Recurrent Gina Ferrara brings a profound sensitivity to her native New Orleans landscape. . . . To see like Ferrara is to feel multiple dimensions at once. . . . Her poems remind us ‘how all our stories were told’ in a narrative built image by image.”
–Rodger Kamenetz, author of Yonder and The Missing Jew: Poems 1976–2022
“Gina Ferrara’s stunning new collection plants our feet in sugarcane fields, yellow-tiled kitchens, and the pink houses of memory where ‘unforgettable orchids bloom.’. . .These poems, and this poet, are truly ‘anchored to land and line’ in the most necessary of ways, and I cannot recommend them strongly enough.”
–Jack B. Bedell, author of Ghost Forest, poet laureate of Louisiana, 2017–19
“With intense intimacy, Gina Ferrara’s poems vividly evoke a life in New Orleans, which is to say, a life where mystery is ordinary as a street name. Wherever you live, let these poems bring you home.”
–Brad Richard, author of Turned Earth
© 2026 University of Louisiana at Lafayette Press
978-1-959569-43-5 | Paperback | 70 pp. | 6" x 9" | September 29, 2026