2Leaf Press – serie

LAST OF THE PO'RICANS Y OTROS AFRO-ARTIFACTS, the debut poetry collection of Not4Prophet, provides an incredible verbal and musical profusion of poetry that reflects the cultural landscapes of the perpetual islands of Puerto Rican and New York City through the eyes of a Puerto Rican born in Ponce, living in El Barrio/East Harlem and the South Bronx. As he elaborates this otherness, which includes the hassles of poverty, racial pride and racial discord, Not4Prophet pays homage to the old school cats from the Nuyorican and Black Arts movements. Written in free verse and layered with cultural and historical references, LAST OF THE PO'RICANS Y OTROS AFRO-ARTIFACTS breaks boundaries and challenges us with iconic imagery and word play that dares to speak of the unspeakable. Vagabond's agit-pop artwork creates a powerful visual to Not4Prophet's raging verse.

BRASSBONES & RAINBOWS is the debut poetry collection of Shirley Bradley LeFlore, an oral poet and?performance artist from St. Louis, Missouri who has been on the scene for over five decades. While LeFlore tackles social, political and cultural issues with a profound love for humanity, she also provides insight into self-identity, inner-strength, beauty and faith. A literary griot, LeFlore shares the fabric of verse through jazz, blues and gospel music. Blending realism with lyricism that is interspersed with humor, these short and accessible verses flow in an easy going, smooth and soothing Southern American dialect mixed with African American Vernacular English -- its intensity changing from poem to poem -- with words serving as musical notes. BRASSBONES & RAINBOWS is a stunning testament to Shirley Bradley LeFlore, a story singer whose words will certainly roll off your tongue.

BROKE BAROQUE is the third in a series of Broke Books by the poet, Tony Medina. The poetry is centered on Medina's iconic "Everyman's" character "Broke," a character that bears witness to his plight of homelessness in a humorous yet profound way. The poetry is peppered with subtle images that talks about Broke's existence and life experiences on the streets of "Any City" through tall tales, anecdotes, episodes, rants and jokes that eloquently convey his marginalization in an unaccommodating society. With razor-sharp scatological whimsy, Medina's iconic ironic existential every man - Broke - bears witness to the plight of homelessness from his curbside porch, torching the capitalist system and its myriad societal contradictions. Using his trademark sardonic wit, Medina portrays Broke's anger, fear, humility and resolve with humor, but at the same time manages to bring moments of levity and hopefulness to Broke's plight. BROKE BAROQUE also gets people to acknowledge the growing number of homeless men, women and children that are multiplying in communities around the country and encourage action. Funny and perversely sharp, whimsical and impassioned, BROKE BAROQUE is compulsively readable and will connect with any book and poetry lover alike.

What is a "Nuyorican"? And what does it mean? Poet, writer and activist Samuel Diaz Carrion explores this question and more in OUR NUYORICAN THING, THE BIRTH OF A SELF-MADE IDENTITY. What started out as blog correspondence for the Nuyorican Poets Cafe's website (2001-2004), quickly turned into a cultural exchange about the Cafe and Puerto Rican culture. OUR NUYORICAN THING is a compendium of those blog entries and emails that also includes Diaz Carrion's poetry seen through the eyes of a "Puerto Rican Indiana Jones" who has quietly studied "the trade route of a new language . . . collecting poetry and stories as the artifacts of the day." This collection is riveting, informative and delightful, and will satisfy any reader with an appetite for cross-cultural discussions.

In THE MORNING SIDE OF THE HILL, Ezra E. Fitz' debut novella, he asks readers: What if you anted up and kicked in everything you had on a belief, a hope, a dream, on faith, and you lost? This is one of the questions facing Willie and Mo, the two insecure, incomplete protagonists that was inspired by--and is an homage to--William Faulkner's classic novel, THE WILD PALMS. Like Faulkner's novel, it unfolds in two parallel stories told in alternating chapters that subtly illuminate one another. Set in Harlem and Crown Heights in Brooklyn, the twin tales gather like a storm to an exhilarating ferocity, culminating in a violent flood of passions that none of the characters can control, and which threatens to drown them all. Faulkner fans may think they know what the end holds for these characters, but rest assured, the finale of THE MORNING SIDE OF THE HILL exposes an unexpected coincidence that Faulkner may have hinted at but never fully explored.

AFTER HOUSES is an extended meditation on homelessness. In unflinching, raw poetry, poet Claire Millikin explores states of homelessness, and a longing for, even a devotion to, houses-houses as spaces where one could be safe and at ease. The poems move through an American landscape, between the South and the North, between childhood and adulthood, reaching toward a home that's never reached, but always at one's fingertips. Throughout this collection, Millikin draws from personal and family history, from classical mythology and architectural theory, to shape a poetry of empathy, in which some of the places where people get lost in America are faced and given place. AFTER HOUSES echo the voices of girls who have not quite survived, but who persist, intact in the way that Rimbaud insists on intactness, in words.

OFF COURSE: ROUNDABOUTS & DEVIATIONS is A. Robert Lee's latest collection that interleaves poetry and prose. Beneath the carefully crafted and accessible surface of Lee's work lies a profound, complex voice that deliberately disrupts traditional literary boundaries and distinctions. Different takes on the odd, oftentimes the antic, at work in the daily round. Seamed in wit, dark but congenial humor, Lee's work is aimed to amuse yet at the same time, stir recognitions. Fake correspondence might just be real. Foodways edge towards the gothic. Each composition comes over as slant, diagonal, oblique. Set phrases turn askew. Geographies un-map themselves, whether ostensibly Europe, England Japan, or America. Of course, it's all OFF COURSE. Enchanting tales of travel and transformation, comedy and capitalism, and unforgettable stories that teach us about our present as well as our past, OFF COURSE uses irony to tickle the mind. It reminds us that contradictions in life are inescapable, and how precarious and unpredictable life really is. Acerbic, volatile and incisive. Life episodes take on the patina of waking slumber, not to say japery and the absurd. Read OFF COURSE without discretion and take out some personal insurance before reading.

TARTESSOS AND OTHER CITIES is Claire Millikin's second book of poetry with 2Leaf Press that continues to explore homelessness. In this collection, Millikin uses the sensitivity of poetry to express some of the emotions surrounded by homelessness and loss. Named for Tartessos, a lost city on the Guadalquivir, a river in Andalusia, Spain that was likely buried by a devastating tidal wave in BC, the poems in TARTESSSOS gather lost cities and places that were not myths, but were once real. Throughout the collection, Millikin addresses questions such as, What happened to home and Where do I come from? that examines American geographies of loss, with the poems serving as archeological elements that persist against these losses. From New York City to Muscogee Country, Georgia, from New Haven, to the Haw River, TARTESSOS charts a map of disappearances and resistances to vanishing that make up part of the ghostly American landscape. In the end, Millikin leads readers to discover that home is not just the place where you happen to live, it is the place where you become yourself.

A COUNTRY WITHOUT BORDERS, POEMS AND STORIES OF KASHMIR is the debut collection of Lalita Pandit Hogan, an expatriate Kashmiri scholar and poet who shares with readers the loss of identity and home, culture, migration, womanhood, otherness and exile. Blooming with intense lyricism and fertile imagery, these full-blooded poems are elegant, mythic, and intricately woven, evoking a home no longer accessible. A COUNTRY WITHOUT BORDERS is an invaluable collection for all who are interested in cultural remembrance and meditations that reflect postcolonial poetry, and for students reading South Asian literature and culture.

Monsters: Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" and "Mathilda" presents Mary Shelley's most popular works, accompanied by a critical introduction and commentary by scholar Claire Milllkin Raymond. Cultures create and ascribe meaning to monsters, endowing them with characteristics derived from their most deep-seated fears and taboos. In this volume, Millikin Raymond explores both Frankenstein and Mathilda from a feminist and cultural studies perspective, illuminating the cultural transgressions that each work presents through its monsters. Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, conceived by Shelley at the age of nineteen and published before she was twenty, is the most famous and enduring imaginative work of the Romantic era. Shelley was keenly aware of contemporary scientific developments and incorporated them into Frankenstein. Monsters includes the 1831 edition of Frankenstein, which Shelley revised as an adult, respecting the artistic maturity and agency of the author. Mathilda, Shelley's second long work of fiction written between August 1819 and February 1820, deals with taboos that haunt our society to this day: incest and suicide. Published for the first time in 1959, it has become Shelley's best-known work after Frankenstein. The version edited by Elizabeth Nitchie in 1959 is presented here. Frankenstein and Mathilda capture readers by force of their astonishing fantasy and range of implication: the definition of "monster," which Millikin Raymond explores as well as other aspects of the Shelley's work. Monsters will resonate profoundly with readers with a background or interest in science fiction, history, and literature, and anyone intrigued by the fundamental questions of creativity and cultural change.

Naomi Raquel Enright's Strength of Soul proposes tangible strategies and ideas on how to challenge systemic racism through naming and resisting the ideology of racial difference and of the white supremacy at its root. Enright explores racism and the language that upholds this ideology through personal narratives that include an examination of her family’s experience. Throughout this volume, Enright shares reflections of her identity growing up as a bilingual, multiethnic individual, and as the mother of a son presumed to be white. She also advances ideas about how to confront societal notions of an inherent difference between the lived experiences of white people and everyone else, notions which result in the widely held belief that there is an inevitable “us” and “them.” Enright suggests that embracing one’s total identity can allow people to challenge systemic racism as well as the language and ideology that created it and upholds it. In these poignant and deeply personal stories, Enright allows readers to imagine a society on a genuine path towards justice, healing, and true transformation. Strength of Soul is for anyone who is willing to rethink the status quo and is interested in creating systemic change regarding institutionalized and internalized racism.