Full Description
The light must spill to shine. The thing you must be is yourself.
Intimate and uncompromising, Rev. Julián Jamaica Soto's debut collection Spilling the Light, is a luminous offering to their communities and a defiant declaration of their worth in a world hostile to their queer, disabled, and brown being.
"America, is this freedom?" they ask. "I cannot prove to you that / I am a person," writing boldly of identity, community, liberation, and erasure through a prism of tender moments and powerful reckonings. These are poems of broken hallelujahs and codes/witching, of hunger and fire, of hope and resilience. They are complex, tender, and empowering. They embolden us to become our truest selves, willing us to survive.
Contents
Spilling the light
Holy Quiet
This cannot be enough America for me
i have tried to write this three times
A Simple Hope
We offer you an imperfect welcome
Snowflakes: A Guide
Taraxacum
Let my life be forward-reaching
Finding Our Dreams
Let us say to our hearts
A Charm for Hope: A String
being universalist is like
But Why This, Why Now
Blessed Are the Hungry
Am I meant to call up courage?
dear trans*, non-binary, genderqueer and gender-expansive friends and kin: (and those of us whose gender is survival)
The Magic of an Empty Palm
To the people who have mistaken freedom for liberation
Neither divisor nor dividend
The Spark Between
The Wonder of a Fist
everything is still on fire
I cannot prove to you that I am/we are human
Showing up for (F)friend(s)
Being a person of color in America today
Bring your broken hallelujah here
We Hold Hope Close
Prevail: an etymology
There are lots of ways to stay alive
The Elephant in the Room, Every Single Room
The Advice
Notes on a Napkin (White Supremacy)
Boldly, you must hang your light
My grandmother's grinding stone/El molcajete de mi abuelita
The part that is not water
When your best friend has four or so legs
Codes/witching
We Hold On
The Name of Tyranny
Where Life Sends You
Mitochondrial Gift
Broken Shellsong
Survivor/ship
Remembering the future
Time for the Work
Reversals of Fortune
the butterfly effect
A Rock in Our Pocket
The Life Slow and Precious
America, is this freedom?
Siete principios de unitario universalista, bueno, más el primero
You are not wrong
Stretch
When There Is No Happy Ending
