Women of Resistance - Danielle Barnhart and Iris Mahan

Women of Resistance - Poems for a New Feminism is a powerful anthology of feminist poetry edited by Danielle Barnhart and Iris Mahan. With contributions from 41 poets, including names such as Elizabeth Acevedo, Mahogany L. Browne, Jacqueline Jones LaMon, and Trish Salah, Women of Resistance is honestly heartstopping at times, so familiar it might take your breath away, and also heartbreaking because there is still so much work to be done.

Read this book slowly, read every word, and read it aloud. Hear your voice rise with the power that the words will infuse into your heart - these poems are for us all, and for our children, and should be read, told, recited, and read again.

Women of Resistance is everyone, is a fight for real equality, encompassing all gender identities, races, ethnicities, and sexuality; songs of pain, of love, of questions, of the toll that patriarchy and racism and classicism have taken on our society. The poems resonate so hard in me, inspiring me, and are a collective account telling me that we are not alone, we don’t need to fight alone, we are in this together. They talk of depression, of war, of injustice, of sexual assault, of childbirth, of abortion, of loss, of love, of breastfeeding, of racism, of brutality, of sisterhood... Of everything.

This anthology of amazing artists hit me like a punch in the stomach but also lifted me to my feet - this is really us, and we can keep using all the tools and talents that we have to make a change.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for the copy - this is one that I will be reading over and over again.

Women of Resistance - Poems for a New Feminism will be published by OR Books by March 13th, 2018.