Devon Walker-Figueroa is the author of Philomath (Milkweed Editions, 2021). A winner of the National Poetry Series and the Levis Reading Prize, Philomath was the first poetry collection to be named a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Prize. Her new collection, Lazarus Species, is forthcoming from Milkweed Editions in 2025. As an Amy Lowell Traveling Scholar, Walker-Figueroa researched quondam sites of resource extraction in the Namib and Kalihari Deserts, exploring the decay of industries and towns within the context of ecological and cultural recovery and reconfiguration.