Book review of Poetry as Spellcasting by Tamiko Beyer

At the intersection of books on witchcraft, inventive writing guides and poetry anthologies alights Poetry as Spellcasting: Poems, Essays, and Prompts for Manifesting Liberation and Reclaiming Power, which manages to tug off one thing completely distinctive.

Centering the experiences and views of writers of coloration and queer writers, the contributors’ essays honor the work of Audre Lorde, Lucille Clifton, Selah Saterstrom and Rainer Maria Rilke, amongst others. They look at the connections amongst poetry, prayer and chant, they usually discover the liberation that may include revision. One writing immediate invitations readers to compose a letter to an “absent presence” or an ancestor; one other offers directions for writing a collective poem with pals. “In this book,” editors Tamiko Beyer, Destiny Hemphill and Lisbeth White conclude, “we remember how the nexus between ritual and poetry can be a sacred container to manifest change and transformation.”