132 pages
Published 2023
Read from February 28 to March 4
Rating: 4 out of 5
I’ve woefully neglected poetry in my recent reads. The last single author collection I read was May Chong’s Seed, Star, Song last summer. I also want to devote more time reading authors I “know” (in whatever capacity) through social media connections.
This collection begins with the powerful statement of “The Hero With An African Face,” and from there upfromsumdirt’s poems balance adroitly at the intersection of Black embodiment and futures, mythology and exploitation, the narratives stolen away and the narratives constructed anew. Ben Sisko of Deep Space Nine obeys obeahs; Dorothy’s not in Kush anymore.
“The Three Sulas” is a particularly staggering work, a tale of three diasporic witches raising the narrator from the dead. Equally brilliant: a nine page, double columned epic titled “The Underground Rubaiyat.”
upfromsumdirt particularly excels at long form poetry. Sprawling, multi-movement celebrations of embodiment and sexuality leap between the stars. A sequence of thirty-eight poems outlines the legendarium of a character named Fayre Gabbro. I only wish I could sustain poetry at that level. I suppose it would help if I truly knew what I had to say.
