Dark // Thing - by Ashley M Jones (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

dark // thing is a multifaceted work that explores the darkness/otherness by which the world sees Black people. Ashley M. Jones stares directly into the face of the racism that allows people to be seen as dark things, as objects that can be killed/enslaved/oppressed/devalued. This work, full as it is of slashes of all kinds, ultimately separates darkness from thingness, affirming and celebrating humanity.

Review Quotes

dark // thing explores the operating costs incurred when blackness--black hair, black bottom, black diction and excellence--are perceived, but not uniquely seen. Ashley Jones has penned towns like Birmingham, Alabama and Flint, Michigan; penned America through the lens of Harriet Tubman, Dwayne Wayne, and the Emancipation Proclamation in a pitch tuned for everyone, whether you're jonseing for sonnets, sestinas, or mathematical proofs. It is imperative that you read these poems, teach these poems, breathe deep this gift of a book.--Marcus Wickers

About the Author

Ashley M. Jones, a faculty member in the creative writing department of the Alabama School of Fine Arts, received an MFA in Poetry from Florida International University. Her debut poetry collection, Magic City Gospel, won the silver medal in poetry in the 2017 Independent Publishers Book Awards. A winner of the 2015 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer's Award, Jones authored poems appearing or forthcoming in a number of publications, including the Academy of American Poets, Tupelo Quarterly, Prelude, Steel Toe Review, Fjords Review, Quiet Lunch, Poets Respond to Race Anthology, and The Harvard Journal of African American Public Policy.