My fifth book is Reparation Gate, published by Shanti Arts in 2023. It’s an extended tribute to my father’s life and work.

You can find an interview about the book here. And, here, a recording of my reading for Scholar Strike of  the last book in the poem, “Heritage,” written for and to Breonna Taylor.

The book has three parts. The first is for my father. The second is engaged with questions of social justice, which was at the heart of my father’s life and which he fostered in me, though my social engagement takes a more reflective, meditative turn. And that difference is the theme of the third part of the book, “Lunar Light.”

This is my most sentimental book. Some poems, like the first, “A Dry Clearing,” seem to carry strong feeling well into art, and others frankly seem to be overwhelmed by that strength of emotion. That’s okay with me. Lauren Berlant has influenced me with her work on sentimentality, arguing that it is a compromise with the politically possible. I don’t mind sharing a sentimental book from the male or masculine side of things.