{"title":"Poetry--American--African American \u0026 Black","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"we-are-owed","title":"We Are Owed.","description":"\u003cp\u003eWe Are Owed. is the debut poetry collection of Ariana Brown, exploring Black relationality in Mexican and Mexican American spaces. Through poems about the author's childhood in Texas and a trip to Mexico as an adult, Brown interrogates the accepted origin stories of Mexican identity. We Are Owed asks the reader to develop a Black consciousness by rejecting U.S., Chicano, and Mexican nationalism and confronting anti-Black erasure and empire-building. As Brown searches for other Black kin in the same spaces through which she moves, her experiences of Blackness are placed in conversation with the histories of formerly enslaved Africans in Texas and Mexico. Esteban Dorantes, Gaspar Yanga, and the author's Black family members and friends populate the book as a protective and guiding force, building the \"we\" evoked in the title and linking Brown to all other African-descended peoples living in what Saidiya Hartman calls \"the afterlife of slavery.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1735352764\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781735352763\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Brown, Ariana, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Grieveland\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Grieveland","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Jul 2021)","offer_id":45656959582405,"sku":"9781735352763","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781735352763.jpg?v=1768885905"},{"product_id":"all-the-possible-bodies","title":"All the Possible Bodies","description":"\u003cp\u003eMemory, story, impressions, witness, culpability, our very humanness course through this book and strip us, via our interaction, of pretense. The poems are language- and image-driven narratives that present us with deep and abiding love, a need for orienting oneself, for respecting the process of orientation. They also dwell in the instantaneous shifts, the sudden changes that simultaneously jar and reassure us. The dreamy realism of the work grounds. Readers are confronted with the unpredictable inertia of life wherein we are challenged daily to find comfort while constantly orienting ourselves. The messiness and complexities of life are often what can bring the greatest joys. There is nakedness, stripping down of pretense, and a love for the primal, emotionally driven self. Some favorite poems are \"Liver of Sulfur,\" \"whatever wilderness contained there,\" \"Arrival: Troy, New York,\" and the final poem in the collection. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1949944905\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781949944907\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Pollock, Iain Haley, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Alice James Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Alice James Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Sep 2025)","offer_id":45657394774213,"sku":"9781949944907","price":28.54,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781949944907.jpg?v=1768891314"},{"product_id":"the-essential-june-jordan","title":"The Essential June Jordan","description":"\u003ci\u003eThe Essential June Jordan\u003c\/i\u003e honors the enduring legacy of a poet fiercely dedicated to building a better world. In this definitive volume, featuring an afterword by Pulitzer Prize-winner Jericho Brown, June Jordan's generous body of poetry is distilled and curated to represent the very best of her works. Written over the span of several decades―from \u003ci\u003eSome Changes\u003c\/i\u003e in 1971 to \u003ci\u003eLast Poems\u003c\/i\u003e in 2001-―Jordan's poems are at once of their era and tragically current, with subject matter including racist police brutality, violence against women, and the opportunity for global solidarity amongst people who are marginalized or outside of the norm. In these poems of great immediacy and radical kindness, humor and embodied candor, readers will (re)discover a voice that has inspired generations of contemporary poets to write their truths. June Jordan is a powerful voice of the time-honored movement for justice, a poet for the ages.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1556596200\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781556596209\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Jordan, June, Levi, Jan Heller, Keller, Christoph\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Copper Canyon Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Copper Canyon Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (May 2021)","offer_id":45657859031237,"sku":"9781556596209","price":23.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781556596209.jpg?v=1768895361"},{"product_id":"lighthead-poems-national-book-award-winner","title":"Lighthead: Poems (National Book Award Winner)","description":"\u003cb\u003eWinner of the 2010 National Book Award for Poetry\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eWatch for the new collection of poetry from Terrance Hayes, \u003ci\u003eAmerican Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin\u003c\/i\u003e, coming in June of 2018\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e In his fourth collection, Terrance Hayes investigates how we construct experience. With one foot firmly grounded in the everyday and the other hovering in the air, his poems braid dream and reality into a poetry that is both dark and buoyant. Cultural icons as diverse as Fela Kuti, Harriet Tubman, and Wallace Stevens appear with meditations on desire and history. We see Hayes testing the line between story and song in a series of stunning poems inspired by the Pecha Kucha, a Japanese presenta­tion format. This innovative collection presents the light- headedness of a mind trying to pull against gravity and time. Fueled by an imagination that enlightens, delights, and ignites, \u003ci\u003eLighthead\u003c\/i\u003e leaves us illuminated and scorched.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0143116967\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780143116967\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Hayes, Terrance, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Penguin Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Mar 2010)","offer_id":45657939476677,"sku":"9780143116967","price":24.7,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780143116967.jpg?v=1768896309"},{"product_id":"bloodmercy","title":"Bloodmercy","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eSelected by Nicole Sealey as the winner of the 2025 APR\/Honickman First Book Prize, \u003ci\u003eBloodmercy\u003c\/i\u003e is a must-read debut that reimagines the tale of Cain and Abel as sisters.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Violence is a failure of communication\" opens this book as an omen and foregrounds a family exiled from Eden. In I.S. Jones's stunning and evocative debut collection, Cain and Abel are reimagined as sisters whose care for each other becomes increasingly fraught-the siblings vicious as they vie for the attention of a negligent father. Parallel to this, their bodies budding within and against the still-forming landscape, the girls navigate the shame of Eve's sin while coming into their own sexuality.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGrounded in the remote natural world, enclosed by firs and redwoods, Bloodmercy follows Cain and Abel through the dense geography of girlhood into young womanhood. Along the way, they discover the limits of power and control, spite and sex, faith and death, and man's dominion over the earth. Found in the space between the Old Testament and the modern world, the girls gaze heavenward and pose enduring questions to God. Lyrical, lush, and bursting with tender imagination, Bloodmercy marks a debut to watch.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-13: 9798987585238\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Jones, I. S., Sealey, Nicole, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: American Poetry Review\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"American Poetry Review","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Sep 2025)","offer_id":45658039943365,"sku":"9798987585238","price":22.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9798987585238.jpg?v=1768897393"},{"product_id":"life-on-mars","title":"Life on Mars","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003e* Poet Laureate of the United States *\u003cbr\u003e* A\u003c\/i\u003e New York Times\u003ci\u003e Notable Book of 2011 and\u003c\/i\u003e New York Times Book Review \u003ci\u003eEditors' Choice *\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e* A\u003c\/i\u003e New Yorker, Library Journal \u003ci\u003eand\u003c\/i\u003e Publishers Weekly \u003ci\u003eBest Book of the Year *\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eNew poetry by the award-winning poet Tracy K. Smith, whose \"lyric brilliance and political impulses never falter\" (\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e, starred review) \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eYou lie there kicking like a baby, waiting for God himself \u003cbr\u003eTo lift you past the rungs of your crib. What \u003cbr\u003eWould your life say if it could talk? \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e --from \"No Fly Zone\" \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith allusions to David Bowie and interplanetary travel, \u003ci\u003eLife on Mars \u003c\/i\u003eimagines a soundtrack for the universe to accompany the discoveries, failures, and oddities of human existence. In these brilliant new poems, Tracy K. Smith envisions a sci-fi future sucked clean of any real dangers, contemplates the dark matter that keeps people both close and distant, and revisits the kitschy concepts like \"love\" and \"illness\" now relegated to the Museum of Obsolescence. These poems reveal the realities of life lived here, on the ground, where a daughter is imprisoned in the basement by her own father, where celebrities and pop stars walk among us, and where the poet herself loses her father, one of the engineers who worked on the Hubble Space Telescope. With this remarkable third collection, Smith establishes herself among the best poets of her generation.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1555975844\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781555975845\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Smith, Tracy K., N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Graywolf Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Graywolf Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (May 2011)","offer_id":45658314080453,"sku":"9781555975845","price":22.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781555975845.jpg?v=1768899570"},{"product_id":"good-dress","title":"Good Dress","description":"\u003cb\u003eWinner of the Lambda Award for Bisexual Poetry\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLonglisted for the 2025 Maya Angelou Book Award\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A once-in-a-generation debut.\"―Angel Nafis\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"This self-assured, dazzling debut has a story to tell.\"―Aricka Foreman \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eFollowing the tradition of Nikky Finney, Krista Franklin, and Morgan Parker, Brittany Rogers's \u003ci\u003eGood Dress\u003c\/i\u003e documents the extravagant beauty and audacity of Black Detroit, Black womanhood, community, class, luxury, materialism, and matrilineage. A nontraditional coming of age, this collection witnesses a speaker coming into her own autonomy and selfhood as a young adult, reflecting on formative experiences. With care and incandescent energy, the poems engage with memory, time, interiority, and community. They also nudge tenderly toward curiosity: What does it mean to belong to a person, to a city? Can intimacy and romance be found outside the heteronormative confines of partnership? And in what ways can the pursuit of pleasure be an anchor that returns us to ourselves?\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1959030833\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781959030836\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Rogers, Brittany, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Tin House\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Tin House","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Oct 2024)","offer_id":45658632913093,"sku":"9781959030836","price":23.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781959030836.jpg?v=1768902006"},{"product_id":"poems-just-give-me-a-cool-drink-of-water-fore-i-diiie-oh-pray-my-wings-are-gonna-fit-me-well-and-still-i-rise-shaker-why-dont-you-sing","title":"Poems: Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'Fore I Diiie\/Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well\/And Still I Rise\/Shaker, Why Don't You Sing?","description":"\u003cb\u003e\"Maya Angelou writes like a song, and like the truth.\"--\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Black, bitter and beautiful, she speaks of our survival.\"--JAMES BALDWIN \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eTenderly, joyously, sometimes in sadness, sometimes in pain, Maya Angelou writes from the heart and celebrates life as only she has discovered it. In this moving volume of poetry, we hear the multi-faceted voice of one of the most powerful and vibrant writers of our time.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0553255762\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780553255768\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Angelou, Maya, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Bantam\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Bantam","offers":[{"title":"Mass Market Paperbacks (Jan 1996)","offer_id":45659086389445,"sku":"9780553255768","price":11.69,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780553255768.jpg?v=1768905808"},{"product_id":"blue-opening-poems","title":"Blue Opening: Poems","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A profound poetic talent.\"--Ada Limón\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eBlue Opening\u003c\/i\u003e, Chet'la Sebree's brilliant, illuminating poetry collection, grapples with origins--of illness, of language, of the universe--as the speaker contemplates whether she, too, can be a site of origin through motherhood. Navigating chronic health challenges alongside grief and questions about the nature of knowledge and religion, she searches personal history and the cosmos for answers to the unknowable. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith startling clarity and vivid tenderness, \u003ci\u003eBlue Opening\u003c\/i\u003e calls into question not only where to begin, but how to create, across thirty-two poems that press the fluid boundaries of form through sonnets, prose poems, odes, and two unforgettable poetic sequences. As the speaker traverses loss, possibility, and the choice, or often the lack of choice, in the direction of her future, she determines to press forward even as she is \"unsure of what shape this language should take \/ and hulling, from blue rock, faith.\"\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1963108469\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781963108460\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Sebree, Chet'la, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Tin House\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Tin House","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Sep 2025)","offer_id":45659286077637,"sku":"9781963108460","price":23.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781963108460.jpg?v=1768907944"},{"product_id":"the-other-revival-poems-reckonings","title":"The Other Revival: Poems \u0026 Reckonings","description":"\u003cp\u003eI want to know what you know about my people\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI said to the caretaker's granddaughter. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI want you to tell me something about them. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe Other Revival is a story of homecoming. This collection of poems revolves around a house built in Harpersville, Alabama in 1841. Thirty-nine people enslaved by Samuel Wallace, the owner of the property, constructed the house and worked the land. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor generations, the house remained in the Wallace family and is now a reconciliation center where Black, white, and mixed-race descendants come together. Salaam Green has led many of these gatherings and worked with descendants to create these, and many other, poems. The Other Revival is her poetic journey to one rural place that is a crossroads of racial, economic, and enslavement heritage. It is an elegy and a blessing. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-13: 9798990220874\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Green, Salaam, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Pulley Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Pulley Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Jun 2025)","offer_id":45659354169541,"sku":"9798990220874","price":23.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9798990220874.jpg?v=1768908484"},{"product_id":"an-optimism-poems","title":"An Optimism: Poems","description":"Here is collection of poems about finding oneself in a life--an ordinary life that one could not have imagined--and making the decision to live it. Against our terribly ambivalent present--in which Black, trans, and other minoritized forms of life seem at once more possible than ever and, also, relentlessly under attack--\u003cem\u003eAn Optimism\u003c\/em\u003e gives us poems in search of ways to survive--and even thrive. Anchored by an epistolary sequence directed to the 20th century poet and activist Pauli Murray, and looking to the work of other trans, queer, and black feminist writers like Audre Lorde, Lucille Clifton, and June Jordan for company and counsel, Cameron Awkward-Rich situate us in spaces intimate and capacious, from lovers' beds to the Gamma Quadrant across the Milky Way. Although it speaks resolutely and intimately from a particular \"I\", \u003cem\u003eAn Optimism\u003c\/em\u003e turns to the creativity of the motley we to, in Hortense Spillers' words, make \"a space for living.\" These are poems for the living, infused with hope and ancestral wisdom.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0892556218\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780892556212\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Awkward-Rich, Cameron, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Persea Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Persea Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Oct 2025)","offer_id":45659669921989,"sku":"9780892556212","price":24.7,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780892556212.jpg?v=1768913291"},{"product_id":"call-us-what-we-carry-poems-1","title":"Call Us What We Carry: Poems","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe instant #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eWall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eUSA Today\u003c\/i\u003e bestseller, now available in paperback and with bonus content!\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThis luminous poetry collection by #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author and presidential inaugural poet Amanda Gorman captures a shipwrecked moment in time and transforms it into a lyric of hope and healing. In \u003ci\u003eCall Us What We Carry\u003c\/i\u003e, Gorman explores history, language, identity, and erasure through an imaginative and intimate collage. Harnessing the collective grief of a global pandemic, this beautifully designed volume features poems in many inventive styles and structures and shines a light on a moment of reckoning. Now in paperback and featuring an interview with the author and a discussion guide, \u003ci\u003eCall Us What We Carry\u003c\/i\u003e reveals that Gorman has become our messenger from the past, our voice for the future.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0593465083\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780593465080\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Gorman, Amanda, N\/A, N\/A\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Viking Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Viking Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Jan 2024)","offer_id":45659828355269,"sku":"9780593465080","price":23.39,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780593465080.jpg?v=1768914610"},{"product_id":"for-all-the-things-i-never-got-to-say","title":"For All The Things I Never Got To Say","description":"From the award-winning poet, Fanta Ballo \"For All The Things I Never Got to Say\" is a collection of poems that tackles topics ranging from family to love and relationships to social injustices. Fanta uses rhymes and metaphors to talk about deep issues as they pertain to her and her experiences. She gives the reader a look into her personal life and takes them on a journey as she is figuring herself out. This book highlights Fanta's journey to loving herself and the heartbreak, the pain and the healing.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0578891433\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780578891439\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Ballo, Fanta, Faye, McKayla, Miller, Carly\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Ratty Reach\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Ratty Reach","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (May 2021)","offer_id":45659879702725,"sku":"9780578891439","price":19.49,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780578891439.jpg?v=1768915311"},{"product_id":"love-poems-1","title":"Love Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIn a career that has spanned more than a quarter century, Nikki Giovanni has earned the reputation as one of America's most celebrated and controversial writers. Now, she presents a stunning collection of love poems that includes more than twenty new works.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFrom the revolutionary \"Seduction\" to the tender new poem, \"Just a Simple Declaration of Love,\" from the whimsical \"I Wrote a Good Omelet\" to the elegiac \"All Eyez on U,\" written for Tupac Shakur, these poems embody the fearless passion and spirited wit for which Nikki Giovanni is beloved and revered.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRomantic, bold, and erotic, \u003cem\u003eLove Poems\u003c\/em\u003e expresses notions of love in ways that are delightfully unexpected. 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Matejka's book is part historic reclamation and part interrogation of Johnson's complicated legacy, one that often misremembers the magnetic man behind the myth.\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0143123726\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780143123729\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Matejka, Adrian\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Penguin Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (May 2013)","offer_id":45937600364741,"sku":"9780143123729","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780143123729.jpg?v=1772881028"},{"product_id":"above-ground","title":"Above Ground","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003ebestselling poetry collection from Clint Smith, author of #1 bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner \u003ci\u003eHow the Word Is Passed\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"A joyful embrace and legacy of bright language and poignant questions.\" --Aimee Nezhukumatathil, author of \u003ci\u003eWorld of Wonders\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Clint Smith's vibrant and compelling new collection traverses the vast emotional terrain of fatherhood, and explores how becoming a parent has recalibrated his sense of the world. There are poems that interrogate the ways our lives are shaped by both personal lineages and historical institutions. There are poems that revel in the wonder of discovering the world anew through the eyes of your children, as they discover it for the first time. There are poems that meditate on what it means to raise a family in a world filled with constant social and political tumult. Above Ground wrestles with how we hold wonder and despair in the same hands, how we carry intimate moments of joy and a collective sense of mourning in the same body. Smith's lyrical, narrative poems bring the reader on a journey not only through the early years of his children's lives, but through the changing world in which they are growing up--through the changing world of which we are all a part. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eAbove Ground\u003c\/i\u003e is a breathtaking collection that follows Smith's first award-winning book of poetry, Counting Descent. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e A Best Book of the Year 2023: \u003ci\u003eTIME\u003c\/i\u003e - \u003ci\u003eNPR\u003c\/i\u003e's Best Books - New York Public Library - \u003ci\u003eElectric Lit - The Root - NBC Today - Mother Jones\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0316543039\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780316543033\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Smith, Clint\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Little Brown and Company\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Little Brown and Company","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover (Mar 2023)","offer_id":46079773376709,"sku":"9780316543033","price":36.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780316543033.jpg?v=1776031715"},{"product_id":"where-the-jazz-band-plays-the-weary-blues-poetry-by-langston-hughes","title":"Where the Jazz Band Plays - The Weary Blues - Poetry by Langston Hughes","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA leading figure of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes was the first to use his poetry to reflect the real daily lives of average Black people. This collection celebrates Black pride and contains messages of hope and optimism from the 1920s.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eLangston Hughes is often referred to as the Poet Laureate of African-American experience. The writer featured themes of cultural heritage, racial discrimination, and optimism in his poetry. He used his work to reflect the struggles of Black people in America, but also to send messages of hope. Jazz and blues had a strong influence on his work and dreams are a recurring theme in his poetry. Not only does Hughes comment on the American dream and Black people's inability to achieve it, but he also uses dreams as a symbol of hope for equity and freedom.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThis collection features several sections, including: \u003c\/p\u003e \u003col\u003e- The Weary Blues\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- Dream Variations\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- The Negro Speaks of Rivers\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- Black Pierrot\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- Water-Front Streets\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- Shadows in the Sun\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003col\u003e- Our Land\u003c\/ol\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eWhere the Jazz Band Plays - The Weary Blues\u003c\/i\u003e has been proudly published by specialist poetry imprint Ragged Hand and features an introductory excerpt by Carl Van Vechten and the introductory essay \u003ci\u003eA Brief History of the Harlem Renaissance\u003c\/i\u003e. 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In his foreword, series judge Carl Phillips calls this book \"rollicking, destabilizing, at once intellectually sly and piercing and finally poignant.\" This is poetry that breaks new literary ground, inspiring readers to think differently about what poems can and should do in a new media society where imaginations are laid bare and there is no thought too provocative to send out into the world.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 030022396X\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780300223965\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Matthews, Airea D., Phillips, Carl\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Yale University Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Yale University Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Mar 2017)","offer_id":46080409403589,"sku":"9780300223965","price":27.24,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780300223965.jpg?v=1776036913"},{"product_id":"the-collected-poems-of-langston-hughes","title":"The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe definitive sampling of a writer whose poems were \"at the forefront of the Harlem Renaissance and of modernism itself, and today are fundamentals of American culture\" (\u003ci\u003eOPRAH Magazine).\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eHere, for the first time, are all the poems that Langston Hughes published during his lifetime, arranged in the general order in which he wrote them. Lyrical and pungent, passionate and polemical, the result is a treasure of a book, the essential collection of a poet whose words have entered our common language. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThe collection spans five decades, and is comprised of 868 poems (nearly 300 of which never before appeared in book form) with annotations by Arnold Rampersad and David Roessel.\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003eAlongside such famous works as \"The Negro Speaks of Rivers\" and Montage of a Dream Deferred, \u003ci\u003eThe Collected Poems\u003c\/i\u003e includes Hughes's lesser-known verse for children; topical poems distributed through the Associated Negro Press; and poems such as \"Goodbye Christ\" that were once suppressed.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0679764089\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780679764083\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Hughes, Langston, Rampersad, Arnold\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Vintage\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Vintage","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Oct 1995)","offer_id":46080430244037,"sku":"9780679764083","price":29.9,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780679764083.jpg?v=1776037029"},{"product_id":"love-is-a-dangerous-word-the-selected-poems-of-essex-hemphill","title":"Love Is a Dangerous Word: The Selected Poems of Essex Hemphill","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor three decades, the legacy of writer, editor, performer, and activist Essex Hemphill has been lovingly sustained through xeroxed copies of his few published works. They are as potent now as they were in the 1980s. With tenderness and rage, Hemphill's poems unflinchingly explore the complex, overlapping identities of sexuality, gender, and race, the American political landscape, and his own experiences as a black gay man during the HIV\/AIDS crisis.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEdited by John Keene and Robert F. Reid-Pharr, \u003cem\u003eLove is a Dangerous Word\u003c\/em\u003e contains selections from Hemphill's only published full-length collection, \u003cem\u003eCeremonies\u003c\/em\u003e--named one of the 25 most influential works of postwar queer literature by the \u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e--alongside rarely seen poems from magazines and chapbooks. It serves as both an introduction to Hemphill's poetic prowess and a treasure trove for those who have long awaited his return to the literary spotlight.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0811232344\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780811232340\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Hemphill, Essex, Keene, John, Reid-Pharr, Robert F.\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"New Directions Publishing Corporation","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Mar 2025)","offer_id":46080520093893,"sku":"9780811232340","price":22.04,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780811232340.jpg?v=1776038044"},{"product_id":"dont-call-us-dead-poems","title":"Don't Call Us Dead: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFinalist for the National Book Award for Poetry\u003cbr\u003eWinner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"[Smith's] poems are enriched to the point of volatility, but they pay out, often, in sudden joy.\"--\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe New Yorker \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAward-winning poet Danez Smith is a groundbreaking force, celebrated for deft lyrics, urgent subjects, and performative power. \u003ci\u003eDon't Call Us Dead\u003c\/i\u003e opens with a heartrending sequence that imagines an afterlife for black men shot by police, a place where suspicion, violence, and grief are forgotten and replaced with the safety, love, and longevity they deserved here on earth. Smith turns then to desire, mortality--the dangers experienced in skin and body and blood--and a diagnosis of HIV positive. \"Some of us are killed \/ in pieces,\" Smith writes, \"some of us all at once.\" \u003ci\u003eDon't Call Us Dead\u003c\/i\u003e is an astonishing and ambitious collection, one that confronts, praises, and rebukes America--\"Dear White America\"--where every day is too often a funeral and not often enough a miracle.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1555977855\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781555977856\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Smith, Danez\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Graywolf Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Graywolf Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Sep 2017)","offer_id":46080541262021,"sku":"9781555977856","price":20.8,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781555977856.jpg?v=1776038186"},{"product_id":"the-hill-we-climb-an-inaugural-poem-for-the-country","title":"The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe instant #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestseller and #1 \u003ci\u003eUSA Today\u003c\/i\u003e bestseller\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cb\u003eAmanda Gorman's electrifying and historic poem \"The Hill We Climb,\" read at President Joe Biden's inauguration. \u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cb\u003e\"Stunning.\" --CNN\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\"Dynamic.\" --NPR\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\"Deeply rousing and uplifting.\" --\u003ci\u003eVogue\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e On January 20, 2021, Amanda Gorman became the sixth and youngest poet to deliver a poetry reading at a presidential inauguration. Taking the stage after the 46th president of the United States, Joe Biden, Gorman captivated the nation and brought hope to viewers around the globe with her call for unity and healing. Her poem \"The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country\" can now be cherished in this special gift edition, perfect for any reader looking for some inspiration. Including an enduring foreword by Oprah Winfrey, this remarkable keepsake celebrates the promise of America and affirms the power of poetry.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 059346527X\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780593465271\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Gorman, Amanda, Winfrey, Oprah\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Viking Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Viking Books","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover (Mar 2021)","offer_id":46080572031173,"sku":"9780593465271","price":20.79,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780593465271.jpg?v=1776038398"},{"product_id":"cord-swell-poems","title":"Cord Swell: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003eHow can we memorialize our dead? How can that memorialization rend the veil between the dead and the living? In her debut volume, brittny ray crowell sifts through decades of obituaries, journals, and other ephemera to exhume the generations of her family from her hometown of Texarkana, Texas. She preserves her relatives' stories in writing and in works of collage, a style of archive that layers the past and the present literally and poetically.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis unique approach transforms \u003cem\u003eCord Swell\u003c\/em\u003e into an altar, an artistically enshrined space where crowell communes with the past and looks to the future. The title poem, in which crowell speaks to an aunt who passed away, poignantly asks, \"if there's any such thing \/ as paradise . . . \/ better than the warmth \/ of your neck . . . \/ how close am i \/ to that context of space?\" Her question acts as a provisional thesis statement for this collection, a poetic attempt to reveal, redress, and interpret those who came before her, especially in the absence of physical traces. Each poem imagines ways to access family members who have died and calls out to ancestors crowell never met.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the process, crowell demonstrates capacious syntactical range, nimbly leaping from haibun to erasure poems, interviews to sonnets. She also invents forms she calls \"grooves,\" which are structured as album tracklists. These techniques marry form with meaning, echoing the voices of lost loved ones in indelible verse. Rhapsodic, inventive, and ambitious, \u003cem\u003eCord Swell\u003c\/em\u003e establishes crowell as one of the most creative and dynamic new voices in poetry.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1324111151\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781324111153\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Crowell, Brittny Ray\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: W. W. Norton \u0026amp; Company\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"W. W. Norton \u0026 Company","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover (Oct 2025)","offer_id":46080643825861,"sku":"9781324111153","price":35.09,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781324111153.jpg?v=1776039227"},{"product_id":"archive-of-desire-a-poem-in-four-parts-for-c-p-cavafy","title":"Archive of Desire: A Poem in Four Parts for C. P. Cavafy","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe National Book Award, PEN\/Voelcker Award, and NAACP Image Award winner returns with another inventive and boundary-breaking book: a sensual journey ignited in the archives of iconic queer Alexandrian poet C. P. Cavafy.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn her first book, Robin Coste Lewis's poems exploded the imagery of the Black female figure from antiquity through the present day. Her second book was an expansive hybrid photographic and poetic study of human migration and the human family. Now she delivers a \"poem in four parts,\" which originated as a musical, visual, and lyrical collaboration with the composer Vijay Iyer, cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, and visual artist Julie Mehretu, with Lewis on the microphone offering a live reading of this sequence. Ignited by their encounters with Cavafy's archive, in the heart of Athens, the multimedia quartet exalted the liminal spaces where desire and diaspora meet--where art often asserts itself most forcefully. In this volume, Lewis brings this performance to life on the page, where the poem weaves in and out of Cavafy's bedrooms, notebooks, and the suppressed erotic excavation underpinning all of his work. Lewis converses directly with Mr. Cavafy: \"often you \/ reminded us that \/\/ the only true \/ barbarians are the ones \/ raging in silence inside \/\/ of our own \/ minds.\" But she also brings equal parts of herself to this study of artistry and sensuality, as in the short, tender section entitled \"Cavafy in Compton\/Closet Anthem: Self-Portrait at Sixteen, 1979.\" \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAs in all Lewis's works, here she reaches across centuries to express what is timeless and not bound by our current moment or our single selves: the discipline and glory of art, the give-and-take of love, the kiss that lives in the moment, and the unfolding journey of being human, whose contours become clear only with the passage of time, the igniting of memory, and the words we find to describe the journey.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1524732605\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781524732608\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Lewis, Robin Coste\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Knopf Publishing Group\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Knopf Publishing Group","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover (Oct 2025)","offer_id":46080841908421,"sku":"9781524732608","price":35.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781524732608.jpg?v=1776040733"},{"product_id":"natural-history-poems","title":"Natural History: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003eA unique work of science and poetry, winner of the Cave Canem Prize, selected by Natasha Trethewey \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA research biologist most recently at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, Brandon Kilbourne illuminates the intersections between science and poetry in poems that demonstrate the wonder, curiosity, and precision required by both disciplines. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eNatural History\u003c\/i\u003e opens by confronting the hidden histories within the study of biology and its links to colonialism, including the revelation that European scientists used slave ships to transport specimens from Africa and the Americas back to Europe. Across the collection, Kilbourne describes how these histories of exploitation are still reflected in dioramas of elephants, rhinoceroses, and African people displayed in natural history museums. Other poems narrate the intricate work of studying fossils, and a longer sequence recounts an expedition above the Arctic Circle to recover evidence of how a fish's fins gave rise to the diversity of limbs found among amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eNatural History\u003c\/i\u003e is a rare and fascinating debut, and Kilbourne's exquisite eye brings the role of the working biologist to life.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1644453673\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781644453674\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Kilbourne, Brandon\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Graywolf Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Graywolf Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Nov 2025)","offer_id":46080902267077,"sku":"9781644453674","price":22.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781644453674.jpg?v=1776041560"},{"product_id":"the-complete-poetry","title":"The Complete Poetry","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe beauty and spirit of Maya Angelou's words live on in this complete collection of poetry\u003cb\u003e, including her inaugural poem \"On the Pulse of Morning\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThroughout her illustrious career in letters, Maya Angelou gifted, healed, and inspired the world with her words. Now the beauty and spirit of those words live on in this new and complete collection of poetry that reflects and honors the writer's remarkable life. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Every poetic phrase, every poignant verse can be found within the pages of this sure-to-be-treasured volume--from her reflections on African American life and hardship in the compilation \u003ci\u003eJust Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie \u003c\/i\u003e(\"Though there's one thing that I cry for \/ I believe enough to die for \/ That is every man's responsibility to man\") to her revolutionary celebrations of womanhood in the poem \"Still I Rise\"\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e(\"Out of the huts of history's shame \/ I rise \/ Up from a past that's rooted in pain \/ I rise\") to her \"On the Pulse of Morning\"\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003etribute at President William Jefferson Clinton's inauguration (\"Lift up your eyes upon \/ The day breaking for you. \/ Give birth again \/ To the dream.\"). \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003ci\u003eMaya Angelou: The Complete Poetry\u003c\/i\u003e also features her final long-form poems, including \"A Brave and Startling Truth,\" \"Amazing Peace,\" \"His Day Is Done,\" and the honest and endearing \u003ci\u003eMother: \u003c\/i\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"I feared if I let you go\u003cbr\u003e You would leave me eternally.\u003cbr\u003e You smiled at my fears, saying\u003cbr\u003e I could not stay in your lap forever\"\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis collection also includes the never-before-published poem \"Amazement Awaits,\" commissioned for the 2008 Olympic Games: \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"We are here at the portal of the world we had wished for\u003cbr\u003e At the lintel of the world we most need.\u003cbr\u003e We are here roaring and singing.\u003cbr\u003e We prove that we can not only make peace, we can bring it with us.\" \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Timeless and prescient, this definitive compendium will warm the hearts of Maya Angelou's most ardent admirers as it introduces new readers to the legendary poet, activist, and teacher--a phenomenal woman for the ages.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0812997875\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780812997873\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Angelou, Maya\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Random House\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Random House","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover (Mar 2015)","offer_id":46081208090821,"sku":"9780812997873","price":39.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780812997873.jpg?v=1776043972"},{"product_id":"black-nature-four-centuries-of-african-american-nature-poetry","title":"Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eBlack Nature\u003c\/i\u003e is the first anthology to focus on nature writing by African American poets, a genre that until now has not commonly been counted as one in which African American poets have participated. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBlack poets have a long tradition of incorporating treatments of the natural world into their work, but it is often read as political, historical, or protest poetry--anything but nature poetry. This is particularly true when the definition of what constitutes nature writing is limited to work about the pastoral or the wild. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eCamille T. Dungy has selected 180 poems from 93 poets that provide unique perspectives on American social and literary history to broaden our concept of nature poetry and African American poetics. This collection features major writers such as Phillis Wheatley, Rita Dove, Yusef Komunyakaa, Gwendolyn Brooks, Sterling Brown, Robert Hayden, Wanda Coleman, Natasha Trethewey, and Melvin B. Tolson as well as newer talents such as Douglas Kearney, Major Jackson, and Janice Harrington. Included are poets writing out of slavery, Reconstruction, the Harlem Renaissance, the Black Arts Movement, and late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century African American poetic movements. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eBlack Nature\u003c\/i\u003e brings to the fore a neglected and vital means of considering poetry by African Americans and nature-related poetry as a whole. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA Friends Fund Publication.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0820334316\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780820334318\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Dungy, Camille T., Alexander, Elizabeth, Aubert, Alvin\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: University of Georgia Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"University of Georgia Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Dec 2009)","offer_id":46081320812741,"sku":"9780820334318","price":50.64,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780820334318.jpg?v=1776044966"},{"product_id":"felon-poems","title":"Felon: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn fierce, agile poems, \u003cem\u003eFelon\u003c\/em\u003e tells the story of the effects of incarceration--canvassing a wide range of emotions and experiences through homelessness, underemployment, love, drug abuse, domestic violence, fatherhood, and grace--and, in doing so, creates a travelogue for an imagined life. Reginald Dwayne Betts confronts the funk of post-incarceration existence in traditional and newfound forms, from revolutionary found poems created by redacting court documents to the astonishing crown of sonnets that serves as the volume's radiant conclusion.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0393542033\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780393542035\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Betts, Reginald Dwayne\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: W. W. Norton \u0026amp; Company\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"W. W. Norton \u0026 Company","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Mar 2021)","offer_id":46081337229509,"sku":"9780393542035","price":20.74,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780393542035.jpg?v=1776045054"},{"product_id":"jimmys-blues-and-other-poems","title":"Jimmy's Blues and Other Poems","description":"\u003cb\u003eAll of the published poetry of James Baldwin, including six significant poems previously only available in a limited edition\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eDuring his lifetime (1924-1987), James Baldwin authored seven novels, as well as several plays and essay collections, which were published to wide-spread praise. These books, among them \u003ci\u003eNotes of a Native Son\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003e The Fire Next Time\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eGiovanni's Room\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eGo Tell It on the Mountain\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ebrought him well-deserved acclaim as a public intellectual and admiration as a writer. However, Baldwin's earliest writing was in poetic form, and Baldwin considered himself a poet throughout his lifetime. Nonetheless, his single book of poetry, \u003ci\u003eJimmy's Blues\u003c\/i\u003e, never achieved the popularity of his novels and nonfiction, and is the one and only book to fall out of print. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e This new collection presents James Baldwin the poet, including all nineteen poems from \u003ci\u003eJimmy's Blues\u003c\/i\u003e, as well as all the poems from a limited-edition volume called \u003ci\u003eGypsy\u003c\/i\u003e, of which only 325 copies were ever printed and which was in production at the time of his death. Known for his relentless honesty and startlingly prophetic insights on issues of race, gender, class, and poverty, Baldwin is just as enlightening and bold in his poetry as in his famous novels and essays. The poems range from the extended dramatic narratives of \"Staggerlee wonders\" and \"Gypsy\" to the lyrical beauty of \"Some days,\" which has been set to music and interpreted by such acclaimed artists as Audra McDonald. Nikky Finney's introductory essay reveals the importance, relevance, and rich rewards of these little-known works. Baldwin's many devotees will find much to celebrate in these pages.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0807084867\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780807084861\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Baldwin, James, Finney, Nikky\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Beacon Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Beacon Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Apr 2014)","offer_id":46081349714117,"sku":"9780807084861","price":22.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780807084861.jpg?v=1776045126"},{"product_id":"the-tradition","title":"The Tradition","description":"\u003cstrong\u003eWINNER OF THE 2020 PULITZER PRIZE FOR POETRY\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFinalist for the 2019 National Book Award\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\"100 Notable Books of the Year,\" \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOne Book, One Philadelphia Citywide Reading Program Selection, 2021\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\"By some literary magic--no, it's precision, and honesty--Brown manages to bestow upon even the most public of subjects the most intimate and personal stakes.\"--\u003cstrong\u003eCraig Morgan Teicher\u003c\/strong\u003e, \"'I Reject Walls': \u003cstrong\u003eA 2019 Poetry Preview\u003c\/strong\u003e\" for\u003cstrong\u003e NPR\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \"A relentless dismantling of identity, a difficult jewel of a poem.\"--\u003cstrong\u003eRita Dove\u003c\/strong\u003e, in her introduction to Jericho Brown's \"Dark\" (featured in the\u003cstrong\u003e \u003cem\u003eNew York Times Magazine\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e in January 2019)\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\"Winner of a Whiting Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship, Brown's hard-won lyricism finds fire (and idyll) in the intersection of politics and love for queer Black men.\"--\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eO, The Oprah Magazine\u003c\/em\u003e \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eNamed a \u003cstrong\u003eLit Hub\u003c\/strong\u003e \"Most Anticipated Book of 2019\"\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOne of \u003cstrong\u003eBuzzfeed's\u003c\/strong\u003e \"66 Books Coming in 2019 You'll Want to Keep Your Eyes On\"\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Rumpus\u003c\/em\u003e \u003c\/strong\u003epoetry pick for \"What to Read When 2019 is Just Around the Corner\"\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOne of \u003cstrong\u003eBookRiot's\u003c\/strong\u003e \"50 Must-Read Poetry Collections of 2019\"\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eJericho Brown's daring new book \u003cem\u003eThe Tradition\u003c\/em\u003e details the normalization of evil and its history at the intersection of the past and the personal. Brown's poetic concerns are both broad and intimate, and at their very core a distillation of the incredibly human: What is safety? Who is this nation? Where does freedom truly lie? Brown makes mythical pastorals to question the terrors to which we've become accustomed, and to celebrate how we survive. Poems of fatherhood, legacy, blackness, queerness, worship, and trauma are propelled into stunning clarity by Brown's mastery, and his invention of the duplex--a combination of the sonnet, the ghazal, and the blues--is testament to his formal skill. \u003cem\u003eThe Tradition\u003c\/em\u003e is a cutting and necessary collection, relentless in its quest for survival while reveling in a celebration of contradiction.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1556594860\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781556594861\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Brown, Jericho\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Copper Canyon Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Copper Canyon Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Apr 2019)","offer_id":46081428324549,"sku":"9781556594861","price":22.1,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781556594861.jpg?v=1776046061"},{"product_id":"homie-poems","title":"Homie: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFINALIST FOR THE 2020 NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FOR POETRY\u003cbr\u003eFINALIST FOR THE 2021 NAACP IMAGE AWARD FOR POETRY \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eDanez Smith is our president \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eHomie\u003c\/i\u003e is Danez Smith's magnificent anthem about the saving grace of friendship. Rooted in the loss of one of Smith's close friends, this book comes out of the search for joy and intimacy within a nation where both can seem scarce and getting scarcer. In poems of rare power and generosity, Smith acknowledges that in a country overrun by violence, xenophobia, and disparity, and in a body defined by race, queerness, and diagnosis, it can be hard to survive, even harder to remember reasons for living. But then the phone lights up, or a shout comes up to the window, and family--blood and chosen--arrives with just the right food and some redemption. Part friendship diary, part bright elegy, part war cry, \u003ci\u003eHomie \u003c\/i\u003eis the exuberant new book written for Danez and for Danez's friends and for you and for yours.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 1644450100\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9781644450109\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Smith, Danez\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Graywolf Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Graywolf Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Jan 2020)","offer_id":46081472069829,"sku":"9781644450109","price":20.8,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9781644450109.jpg?v=1776046378"},{"product_id":"black-girl-call-home","title":"Black Girl, Call Home","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Most Anticipated Book of 2021 by \u003ci\u003eOprah Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cb\u003e-\u003cb\u003e \u003ci\u003eTime\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cb\u003e- \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e 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necessary\u003cb\u003e.\"--\u003ci\u003eVogue\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom spoken word poet Jasmine Mans comes an unforgettable poetry collection about race, feminism, and queer identity. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e With echoes of Gwendolyn Brooks and Sonia Sanchez, Mans writes to call herself--and us--home. Each poem explores what it means to be a daughter of Newark, and America--and the painful, joyous path to adulthood as a young, queer Black woman. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eBlack Girl, Call Home\u003c\/i\u003e is a love letter to the wandering Black girl and a vital companion to any woman on a journey to find truth, belonging, and healing.\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0593197143\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780593197141\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Mans, Jasmine\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Berkley Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Berkley Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Mar 2021)","offer_id":46081480229061,"sku":"9780593197141","price":23.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780593197141.jpg?v=1776046434"},{"product_id":"head-off-split-poems","title":"Head Off \u0026 Split: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003eWinner, 2011 National Book Award for Poetry \u003cbr\u003e Winner, 2012 GCLS Award for Poetry \u003cbr\u003e Winner, 2012 SIBA Book Award for Poetry \u003cbr\u003e Nominee, 2012 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Poetry \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e The poems in Nikky Finney's breathtaking new collection \u003ci\u003eHead Off \u0026amp; Split \u003c\/i\u003esustain a sensitive and intense dialogue with emblematic figures and events in African American life: from civil rights matriarch Rosa Parks to former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, from a brazen girl strung out on lightning to a terrified woman abandoned on a rooftop during Hurricane Katrina. Finney's poetic voice is defined by an intimacy that holds a soft yet exacting eye on the erotic, on uncanny political and family events, like her mother's wedding waltz with South Carolina senator Strom Thurmond, and then again on the heartbreaking hilarity of an American president's final State of the Union address. \u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eArtful and intense, Finney's poems ask us to be mindful of what we fraction, fragment, cut off, dice, dishonor, or throw away, powerfully evoking both the lawless and the sublime.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"display:none\"\u003eISBN-10: 0810152169\u003cbr\u003eISBN-13: 9780810152168\u003cbr\u003eAuthor: Finney, Nikky\u003cbr\u003ePublisher: Triquarterly Books\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Triquarterly Books","offers":[{"title":"Paperback (Jan 2011)","offer_id":46081567785157,"sku":"9780810152168","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0708\/6414\/2533\/files\/9780810152168.jpg?v=1776047303"},{"product_id":"song-of-my-softening","title":"Song of My Softening","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Finalist for a 2025 NAACP Image Award (Outstanding Literary Work - Poetry)\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe raw poems inside \u003cem\u003eSong of My Softening\u003c\/em\u003e study the ever-changing relationship with oneself, while also investigating the relationship that the world and nation has with Black queerness. 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A collage of song, culture, and circumstance, alive and speaking.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eTyehimba Jess\u003c\/b\u003e' numerous awards include fellowships from the NEA and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. A native of Detroit, he is a proud alumnus of the Chicago Green Mill Slam teams and Cave Canem. 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