Cardinals

“Amy Speace is an accomplished singer-songwriter, so she knows how to tell a story, how to make the listener care, and how to create something beautiful and meaningful that will live inside a person for years to come.”—Maggie Smith, author of Goldenrod

Amy Speace’s debut collection of poetry, The Cardinals, is a lyrical investigation of marriage, divorce, mothering, and mysticism told through poems that read like intimate conversations but evoke the complexities of love and loss through the natural world. 

An award-winning songwriter, championed early by Judy Collins (who has recorded her songs), she is an established presence in the Nashville songwriting scene and has been playing concerts throughout the world for the last twenty years. Her songs have always been celebrated for their poetic lyrics, and during Covid and a break in her touring career, Speace received her MFA in poetry from Spalding University. She was mentored by Maggie Smith and clearly comes from the lineage of Smith and Sharon Olds. Speace tackles the internal language of coming together and splitting apart, evoking rivers and birds, the South and the North, weather and racism and family history and it all comes together like birdsong.

The Cardinals is Amy Speace's debut collection. She is an award-winning Americana folk singer and songwriter discovered by Judy Collins. Her songs have been recorded by Ms. Collins and many others and she has won International Song of the Year from the Americana Music Association (UK). Her writing has been published in The New York Times, Ihe Guardian, Working Mother, and Salon.com. She received her MFA from Spalding University and teaches English at Cumberland University. She resides in Nashville, Tennessee, with her son, Huckleberry, and her dog, Dusty Springfield.