Poems of migration, womanhood, trauma, and resilience from the celebrated collaborator on Beyonce's Black Is King and Lemonade, award-winning Somali-British poet Warsan Shire. With her first full-length poetry collection, Warsan Shire introduces us to a young girl, who, in the absence of a nurturing guide, is raised by "God and Oprah on TV" and "all the voices in her head." Drawing from her own life and those of loved ones, as well as pop culture and news headlines, Warsan Shire finds vivid, unique details in experiences of refugees and immigrants, victims of abuse, Black women, and teenage girls. In Warsan's hands, these lives spring into fullness. This is noisy life: full of music and weeping and television and sirens and birds. This is fragrant life: full of blood and perfume and shisha smoke and liquor and incense. This is polychrome life: full of henna and moonlight and lipstick and turmeric and kohl. The long-awaited collection from one of our most exciting contemporary poets, this book is a blessing, an incantatory celebration of resilience and survival. Each reader will come away changed.
Poems of migration, womanhood, trauma, and resilience from the celebrated collaborator on Beyonce's Black Is King and Lemonade, award-winning Somali-British poet Warsan Shire. With her first full-length poetry collection, Warsan Shire introduces us to a young girl, who, in the absence of a nurturing guide, is raised by "God and Oprah on TV" and "all the voices in her head." Drawing from her own life and those of loved ones, as well as pop culture and news headlines, Warsan Shire finds vivid, unique details in experiences of refugees and immigrants, victims of abuse, Black women, and teenage girls. In Warsan's hands, these lives spring into fullness. This is noisy life: full of music and weeping and television and sirens and birds. This is fragrant life: full of blood and perfume and shisha smoke and liquor and incense. This is polychrome life: full of henna and moonlight and lipstick and turmeric and kohl. The long-awaited collection from one of our most exciting contemporary poets, this book is a blessing, an incantatory celebration of resilience and survival. Each reader will come away changed.