Kiki Petrosino

Kiki Petrosino (born 1979) is an American poet and professor of poetry. She currently teaches at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Early life and education Petrosino was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. After spending two years in Switzerland teaching Italian and English in a private school, she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Virginia (2001), a Master of Arts in humanities degree from the University of Chicago (2004), and a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop (2006).

Career Petrosino previously taught at the University of Louisville in Louisville, Kentucky, and Spalding University, also in Louisville.

Her collection of poetry Witch Wife was cited by The New York Times as one of the best works of poetry of 2017. Her work has earned her fellowships such as the Al Smith Fellowship from the Kentucky Arts Council and the 2019 Fellowship in Creative Writing from the National Endowment for the Arts. Her prose has appeared in publications including Ploughshares, Poetry Magazine, Iowa Review, and more.

Reviewers have praised Petrosino's use of repetition and unconventional hyphenation in conjunction with traditional poetic forms such as the sestina. Petrosino has cited her familiarity with the Italian language and its comparative inflexibility as inspiration for her play with English. White Blood: A Lyric of Virginia (2020) Petrosino's poems have appeared in Best American Poetry and Tin House.