Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky

Damn, y’all. I’ve been looking forward to this book’s launch and it delivered! If you’re going to read one book of poetry in the near future, this is my recommendation. The book is a narrative, a story of war coming to a town, the resistance of the people, and the inevitable outcome of their choices. It’s a story, a commentary on our current political climate, and beautiful/devastating poems. Seriously, buy here.

From “I, This Body”

Wife taken, child // not three days out of the womb, in my arms, our apartment / empty, on the floor // the dirty snow from her boots.

From “A City Like a Guillotine Shivers On Its Way to the Neck”

At the trial of God, we will ask: why did you allow all this? / And the answer will be an echo: why did you allow all this?

From “Firing Squad”

Tonight they shot fifty women on Lerna Street. / I sit down to write and tell you what I know: / a child learns the world by putting it in her mouth, / a girl becomes a woman and a woman, earth.