Washington: Prize-winning India-born poet Reetika Vazirani and her two-year-old son were found dead with their wrists slashed at their house in a posh section of the US capital.

Police has found a note from the scene with references to the boy's father, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and Princeton University Professor Yusef Komunyakaa.

Police called the deaths an apparent murder-suicide, pending an official ruling 'The Washington Post' reported quoting sources.

Neighbours and friends told reporters that there had been signs that Vazirani was distraught.

The day before the incident, the poetess had a meeting with a neighbourhood Catholic priest and borrowed a bible from a neighbour.

Konunyakaa could not be reached and relatives in the area refused to comment.

Vazirani's first book 'White Elephants' fetched her a Barnard New Women Poet's Prize in 1996 and her second book 'World Hotel' won the 2003 Anisfield-Wolf-Book Award.

Vazirani, who used verse to describe her experience as a child and as an Indian immigrant, was staying with her son Jehan for the summer in the Chevy Chase home of her friend and novelist Howard Norman and poet Jane Shore, who are spending the summer at their home in Vermont.

PTI