Danez Smith

Smith is brilliant, one of the few exceptions to the rule that I don't really connect with poetry. Smith's work carves me out and teaches me. This collection is about the blood of black men, those who fall to white supremacy whether through the violence it creates, validates, and perpetuates, to HIV, or to suicide and other weapons. Their work is so raw, I almost feel like a voyeur reading it, as if I am seeing something private, the most intimate grief. This is stunning.

I read the collection and then got the audio read by the author. The experience is different and I am glad I did both.… (more)

This is a collection that I knew ahead of time I was going to LOVE and LOVE it I did. The visceralness of the heartbreak and the rage and the possibility and the worship. The openness of it all laid out in front of you, whether it hurts to look at or crinkles your eyes with recognition, with hope. I wrote down a number of poems as favorites, but how better to close than with the line that close the collection:

who says the grace of a black man in motion is not perfect
as a tusk in the sun or a single leaf taking its sweet time to the ground?

… (more)