The percussive poems of Stripper in Wonderland move from birth to death, funk to hip-hop, and racism to religion as Derrick Harriell explores the life of a modern black man transplanted from the American Midwest to the Deep South. Harriell summons the ghosts of the past as he deals with the realities of the present. He carefully winds images and words together to produce powerful, often graphic, poems that inform our view of one another as they punch through our assumptions.

Stripper in Wonderland: Poems (Southern Messenger Poets)

Literature & Fiction

Harriell, Derrick

Poetry

LSU Press

Derrick Harriell?s new book, Come Kingdom, chronicles a Black man?s journey toward an ever-elusive American Dream with poems anchored in the trenches of personal crossroads ranging from child conception to substance abuse and racism. The collection follows a male speaker as he and his partner family plan, hoping to provide their son with a sibling. Their troubles burst through in bold poems that incorporate both medical and mental hurdles. At the same time, it pays homage to Black musical icons such as Marvin Gaye, Whitney Houston, Tupac Shakur, and Nipsey Hussle. With spirited vulnerability and gritty lyricism, Harriell reveals the stakes and hauntings of relentless generational traumas. A tour de force of outcry and courage, Come Kingdom confronts shifting social, political, and musical climates. On a more intimate level, it also follows a couple?s desperate attempts to become parents again.

Come Kingdom: Poems (Southern Messenger Poets)

Poetry. African American Studies. "In his remarkable debut collection, COTTON, Derrick Harriell has created a mural in poems. The characters that inhabit this vivid tableau step into an active third dimension and allow us to witness the vicissitudes of their daily struggles, triumphs large and small, private desires. The community here is anchored by a specific Midwestern, African-American family which, in spite of both external and internal challenges, maintains its unity, however precarious at times. Death, passion, humor, mother wit, history, place, these are the colors that Harriell mixes and applies with such artistry that readers may not be so sure if they are watching a particular world or if that world is watching them. Harriell is among America's most exciting new voices in poetry"--Maurice Kilwein Guevara.

Cotton

Aquarius Press/Willow Books

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Harriell, Derrick. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Harriell, Derrick

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Harriell, Derrick. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Stripper in Wonderland: Poems (Southern Messenger Poets)

Come Kingdom: Poems (Southern Messenger Poets)

Cotton