One of our favorite things about working at YesYes Books is seeing authors who published their first or second chapbooks with us go on to put even more brilliance out in the world. We are so lucky to be able to witness the work these authors do! Here are just a few of the amazing things our chapbook authors are accomplishing out there:
Huge congratulations to Justin Phillip Reed on winning the Lambda Literary Award in Gay Poetry for his debut poetry collection, Indecency (Coffee House Press, 2018)!
We are always in awe of Reed's insightful, powerful poetry, and we're so happy to have had the privilege of publishing his debut chapbook, A History of Flamboyance.
A History of Flamboyance is still available to order from our website through the YYB 2016 Subscription! With the 2016 subscription, you will receive this book in addition to all the other incredible titles we released in 2016. 40% off the list price!
Torch Song: Your Man
I am, while couched in solitude, a dullness— my use so induced by his movements that, when my turn approaches and his gaze grades across me,
I scintillate like the newest-born facet of an axe blade.
We are thrilled to see Ocean Vuong's debut novel, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (Penguin, 2019), making such a strong impact on so many readers.
It has been a joy to witness Vuong's work out in the world. We are so happy we got to publish his second chapbook, No, at YesYes Books. While this limited run chapbook is completely sold out and out of print, we thought we'd share a poem from No:
torso of air
Suppose you do change your life. & the body is more than
a portion of night—sealed with bruises. Suppose you woke
& found your shadow replaced by a black wolf. The boy, beautiful
& gone. So you take the knife to the wall instead. You carve & carve.
Until a coin of light appears & you get to look in, for once,
on happiness. The eye staring back from the other side—
waiting.
Fatimah Asghar is a force to be reckoned with.
Since publishing her debut chapbook, After, at YesYes Books, she has gone on to create an Emmy-nominated web series, Brown Girls, and has since published her beautiful debut poetry collection, If They Come For Us (One World, 2018), which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Bisexual Poetry! Not stopping there, she is co-editor, along with Safia Elhillo, of Halal If You Hear Me (Haymarket Books, 2019), an anthology that celebrates Muslim writers who are also women, queer, gender nonconforming, and/or trans writers.
After is also an out of print chapbook from YesYes Books, but we'd like to share a poem from this stunning title as well!
Playroom
i never had enough kens
so i made my barbies fuck
each other or fuck beanie babies.
i never had more than one beanie baby
per species. they were rarer
that way & like some ass backwards
noah’s ark, it kept them from multiplying.
no one with skin like theirs, freaks
like me. lucky the barbies needed their bodies.
in my playroom, the only place
i could be white, whole cities
of beautiful women with boundless tits
fucking loose sacks of animal
their plastic legs thrusting
& thrusting until the beanie
said yes, until it punctured
balls of beans spilling
to the floor. the ladies fucked
their corpses until my aunt
made me throw them out.
the legions of identical
white women, skin glowing
like pearly milk, magnificent
as they stormed the gates
of the zoo, conquering each animal one limb at a time.
