Dave Harris's stellar debut takes a nuanced look at the complexities of black masculinity.
Patricide
weighs those complexities and how they impact a lineage of black boys who fight to become men in the image of their fathers. More than just a book about fear or death centered on being black in America,
illuminates the internal struggle to be the best man possible with the shadow of other men at your back.
Through poems on loss, music, college, and family strife, Harris examines how time shifts and changes, despite so much of a life's architecture staying the same. Ultimately,
opens itself up to reveal a story of many threads, one that finds a way to tie together in unexpected and joyful ways.
Advance praise for
In these poems, Harris wrests language from the havoc white supremacy and patriarchy have wreaked. Which is to say: these are love poems doused in rage.
-Claire Schwartz Author of Bound
Patricide restricts nothing in its narrative but accomplishes everything in its clear voice and uncompromised mission.
-Will Evans Author of Still Cant Do My Daughters Hair
Particide is no ordinary book of poetry. It's “Bars Poetica” — where elegy, invective, the contemporary, and pedestrian converge to create a disarming barrage of thudding verse. Read it like you need it.
-Marcus Wicker, Author of Silencer