From a young age she began a love affair with words, sharing the gift of poetry with her grandmother as they did their household chores. The colors not only of San Miguel have inspired her, but also New England fall landscapes, the seascapes of the Mediterranean, the beaches and mountains of Greece. Friend and fellow poet, William Dougherty, has said of Read and her poems that she “melds visual imagery, allusions to the visual arts, and the singing colors of diverse topographical or place poems, evokes the classical concept of ‘picture poesis,’ a speaking picture. What radiates from her poems is not merely an impasto of description but the pulmonary [spiritual breath of life] processing of coloring vision.”