Heavy Is the Head - by Sumaya Enyegue (Paperback)

About the Book

"This collection does not aim to heal anyone who reads it, but instead help them confront their own healing. Rather than sugar-coated bullets that enter you lightly, these poems are designed to hurt. They are for the girls with difficult names, the boys with softness at their core, and the people with neither. They are meant for the people who are Black, and the people who are not-- because we are all tethered together by the heaviness of the human experience"--Back cover.

Book Synopsis

"Where does all the grief go when it's not tugging at your wrist?" Enyegue's debut collection is an ode to girlhood, to Blackness, to generational trauma, sexual assault, and mental health.

This collection does not aim to heal anyone who reads it, but instead help them confront their own healing. Rather than sugar-coated bullets that enter you lightly, these poems are designed to hurt. They are for the girls with difficult names, the boys with softness at their core, and the people with neither. They are meant for the people who are Black, and the people who are not--because we are all tethered together by the heaviness of the human experience.

Review Quotes

"Matter-of-factly accomplished and compelling." -- Foreword Reviews

About the Author

Sumaya Enyegue is a poet from Cape Town, South Africa, trying to navigate her early twenties while simultaneously juggling med school and spilling her feelings all over social media. When she isn't writing, you can find her reading, frantically trying to find her stethoscope, or pretending she's a functioning adult. Her favorite things include the color green, British panel shows, her family, her friends, and Captain Raymond Holt from B99.