Electric Arches by Eve L. Ewing

3 Stars

I write this review as an outsider.

Poetry is often intensely personal in ways prose avoids. This is a collection of insights, remembrances, and calls to push forth. It is also an invitation for readers, to bear witness, to reflect.

"What words can you offer us to help us be free black people in a world that does not love us?"

A rating on technique I am not qualified to give, so the rating is strictly subjective. I did enjoy it. I appreciated being invited to step inside a place I'm not allowed and observe. As a non-colored person that is the only role I can have reading this.

Ewing addresses the weight of race, of social injustice, of struggle, but also the strength and beauty inherent.

I am in the universe and it is my hair.
each strand arched electric and perfectly still
before my eyes, dancing, crooked,
arranged just so in the air
like the last humming chord of a song.
-excerpt, 'at the salon'

I grew up in the Caribbean. Many of my friends were black, and I was in awe of the intricate hairstyles they would come to school with, Monday mornings were magic. Revealed were the hours they spent with their sisters and mothers braiding and beading. I think it was envy. To never have your hair slip out of a ponytail during basketball, to not have to brush it all the time, and to have people who would want to spend seven hours doing your hair. Definitely envy.

A man can be may things: a snare drum
or a willow tree with its branches dragging down into the muddy water,
the white rind of a watermelon, or a run in your stockings,
or the moment that you see our name
written on the inside of a desk at school
and it wasn't you who wrote it. 

But you can be your own gin
and your best sip too.
You can make him with a nation and still be sovereign,
your own gold coin and your own honest trade.
You can touch his hand
and still be your own snapping fingers
when the snare has gone quiet.
-excerpt, 'appletree'

Magical realism is a genre borne out of oppression. A way to break reality in unrealistic ways in order to create something magical. It is optimistic by its nature because it provides trapped people modes of escape in the ugly of contemporary times. Not all the poems utilize it, but the ones that do have an extraordinary playfulness.

Again, a spectacular and gorgeous cover. The full image is even more amazing.