Deborah Kahan Kolb was born and raised in an insular Hasidic community in Brooklyn, NY, and many of the poems featured in her debut chapbook Windows and a Looking Glass are reflective of her strict religious upbringing. Ultimately, she left the constraints of the community and has written poetry informed not only by her uniquely challenging past, but also by family and community, marriage and children, and shared histories and experiences. Windows and a Looking Glass is the poet's first offering - a gathering of anecdotes, snippets, and glimpses of characters and stories that populate the childhood and adulthood of this first-time author. The poems take the reader on a modern and edgy, autobiographical and biographical, observant and experiential excursion through childhood and community, relationships and marriage, and back to childhood and parenting on the other end.

Poems included in this collection are winners of the Queens College James E. Tobin Poetry Award, "Zhou Ling," a finalist for the Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Award, and "Eldest Daughter," a piece that highlights the oppression of women in Hasidic communities (in Veils, Halos & Shackles).