The driving impulse of Amy LeBlanc's new collection of poetry, I used to live here, is an examination of chronic illness, disability, and autoimmunity. The collection also aims to find moments of magic and ritual within the experience of illness and to find new metaphors for illness and autoimmunity that do not rely on militarization, self-cannibalism, or suicide. LeBlanc thinks deeply about autoimmunity and the poetic representations of the body that self-destructs and that cannot recognize itself? specifically, she asks: What does a body feel like when it doesn't feel like a home? What does it look like when a body self-destructs? How do we write through and about bodily doubt?
