You find love in the fist that comes flying
You find love in the abusive words that flow from his mouth
You find love in being on financial lockdown
You find love in being talked down to
in fearing for your life
You find love in being made an object
You find love in all that?
Why not find love that encourages you
Why not find love that makes you happy
Why not find love that takes care of you
That speaks only good things to you
Why not find love that you don’t have to question
If you’re gonna wake up the next morning or not?
Pack your bags tonight
Make sure to not look back
Get up and leave
Be done with that
—Dakota Blakney, Spit Fire
In an increasingly polarized and hostile world, how can we articulate our concerns? How can we use writing to express and uplift ourselves and our communities in order to enact social change? In this anthology, young poets explore themes of race, gender, fear, violence, empowerment, and family inspired by contemporary poets including Danez Smith, Elizabeth Acevedo, Jamaal May, and Patricia Smith, and poetic form such as haiku and erasure.
Full of energy and passion, the poems in Spit Fire react to recent incidents of police brutality and examine gender roles and abuses of power. Amid stirring meditations on the self and what it means to have a voice, these voices whisper, shout, cry, and urge for undivided attention, for action.
