Dikt

THE POEMSYou fell asleep on the tiles, a translucent peacock loomed, your sex opened and let out a very blue, very high flame.You wore a split veil, that morning. Silent, nailed to her chair, the seated woman writes. She cracks. The poems fidget, slip their fingers: they seek to enter. Perched on her shoulder, the poems whisper in her ear. She captures their messages: "I love the sacred contortions you offer me." The poems protest: "You're squeezing us too hard: careful, pet."More than descriptors, the words behave as commands or moves in a game-and the voice of the seated woman rises to play.

Myth, the much-anticipated debut collection from the multi-talented Terese Mason Pierre, weaves between worlds ('real' and 'imaginary') unearthing the unsettling: our jaded and joyful relationships to land, ancestry, trauma, self, and future. In three movements and two interludes, the poems in Myth move symphonically from tropical islands to barren cities, from lucid dreams to the mysteries of reality, from the sea to the cosmos. A dynamic mix of speculative poetry and ecstatic lyricism, the otherworldly and the sublime, Pierre's poems never stray too long or too far from the spell of unspoiled nature: "The palm trees nod / at the ocean / the ocean does / what it always does / trusts the moon completely."Friends 'with benefits' tour the wonders of Grenada's landscapes; extraterrestrials visit the Caribbean and the locals don't seem phased; red birds "saunter airily like tourists," La Diablesse lures helpless suitors to their dooms. This collection asks: How can myths manifest themselves in our daily lives? What do we actually mean when we say we love ourselves and others? And how do we pursue/create futures that honour our truths, histories and legacies?

Borrowing its title from a finance term-"the estimated price of a good or service for which no market price exists"-Shadow Price is a stunning debut that examines the idea of value in a world that burns under our capitalist lens.  What gives life value? How do we serve existing societal structures that determine its cost? Employing both surreal and documentary imagery, Farah Ghafoor's arresting collection articulates how narrative is used to revise the past and manipulate the future, ultimately forming our present-day climate crisis. Interrogating personal complicity, generational implications, and the shock of our collective disregard for a world that sustains every living thing, Shadow Price captures the complexities of living and writing as a young poet born in the year that "climate change denial" first appeared in print. Mourning the loss of Earth's biodiversity, from insects to mammoths to trees, these introspective poems invite us to consider the risks and rewards of loving what may vanish in our lifetime. Shadow Price charges readers to contemplate their power and purpose in the world today, recognizing that there is hope even in the belly of the beast.

'In the morning I drink / coffee until I can see / a way to love life / again. It's okay, there's / no difference between flying and thinking / you're flying until / you land. Somehow / I own like six nail clippers / and I honestly can't / remember ever buying / even one.' Instantly quotable and unique, PAPER CROWN combines the play and humour of Heather's earliest work with the emotional and autobiographical turn of THE CRYING BOOK. In poems such as 'Suggested Donation,' 'Mistake,' and 'Perfect Song,' as well as previously unpublished work, Christle explores familial relationships, the nature of memory, and the outer edges of imagination. Poems from PAPER CROWN have appeared in The Best American Poetry, Granta, The Nation, The New Yorker, and The White Review. With tenderness and verve, honesty and curiosity, PAPER CROWN continues Christle's lifelong pursuit of understanding the ways that we can move words, and how words in turn can move us.