This Is the Honey
An Anthology of Contemporary Black Poets
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
A breathtaking poetry collection on hope, heart, and heritage from the most prominent and promising Black poets and writers of our time, edited by #1 New York Times bestselling author Kwame Alexander.
In this comprehensive and vibrant poetry anthology, bestselling author and poet Kwame Alexander curates a collection of contemporary anthems at turns tender and piercing and deeply inspiring throughout. Featuring work from well-loved poets such as Rita Dove, Jericho Brown, Warsan Shire, Ross Gay, Tracy K. Smith, Terrance Hayes, Morgan Parker, and Nikki Giovanni, This Is the Honey is a rich and abundant offering of language from the poets giving voice to generations of resilient joy, “each incantation,” as Mahogany L. Browne puts it in her titular poem, is “a jubilee of a people dreaming wildly.”
This essential collection, in the tradition of Dudley Randall’s The Black Poets and E. Ethelbert Miller’s In Search of Color Everywhere, contains poems exploring joy, love, origin, race, resistance, and praise. Jacqueline A.Trimble likens “Black woman joy” to indigo, tassels, foxes, and peacock plumes. Tyree Daye, Nate Marshall, and Elizabeth Acevedo reflect on the meaning of “home” through food, from Cuban rice and beans to fried chicken gizzards. Clint Smith and Cameron Awkward-Rich enfold us in their intimate musings on love and devotion. From a “jewel in the hand” (Patricia Spears Jones) to “butter melting in small pools” (Elizabeth Alexander), This Is the Honey drips with poignant and delightful imagery, music, and raised fists.
Fresh, memorable, and deeply moving, this definitive collection a must-have for any lover of language and a gift for our time.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This essential anthology, edited by poet and YA author Alexander (Why Fathers Cry at Night), includes work by more than 100 living Black poets, from Elizabeth Acevedo to Rita Dove. In his introduction, Alexander centers joy and wonder as guiding principles behind his selections, describing the anthology as "a gathering space for Black poets to honor and celebrate. To be romantic and provocative. To be unburdened and bodacious." Indeed, joy permeates the poems, from Tony Medina's ebullient "Black Boys," in which he writes, "Black boys be bouquets of tanka/ Bunched up like flowers," to Tyree Daye's "Inheritance," a meditation on what connects people to their forebears: "My mother will leave me her mother's deep-black/ cast-iron skillet someday,/ I will fry okra in it,/ weigh my whole life on its black handle,/ lift it up to feel a people in my hand." Xan Forest Phillips's "Want Could Kill Me" explores desire and intimacy: "I want to buy you/ a cobalt velvet couch/ all your haters' teeth/ strung up like pearls/ ...but my pockets/ are filled with/ lint and love alone." Featuring a refreshing mix of established and emerging voices, this vital volume showcases a thriving and multifaceted poetic tradition.
