Distributed by YesYes Books and Ingram
Cover Art: Shaylin Wallace | SMW Visuals
Design: Olivia Hammerman
$20 | 94 pages | ISBN: 978-1-946303-15-8
Poetry l Perfectbound | June 16, 2026
“Watch me nourish & be nourishment.” In sipèstisyon Mckendy Fils-Aimé invites us, to poems that are vivid, clear eyed, and always surprising with the abundance of gifts that’s our life: “summer we shoplifted / too many bars from Pathmark,” one piece begins as it goes on to give us wisdom that is memory. But this poet also knows, too well, that “sometimes we make art by archiving grief.”
—Ilya Kaminsky, author of Deaf Republic
As a poetry collection, sipèstisyon strikes a balance between wound and wonder. A fractured family, a falling out among schoolchildren, ordering pâté at a Haitian bakery, or a conversation after a car crash are all handled with the same precision and longing for tenderness. This is a one-of-a-kind debut where shame blossoms into a harvest with glittering diction and generational trauma is subverted with an unflinching gaze.
—Casey Rocheteau, author of Gorgoneion
sipèstisyon by Mckendy Fils-Aimé is a lyrical excavation of memory, migration, and mythology—both personal and collective. Rooted in Haitian superstition and shaped by the echoes of generational trauma, these poems weave between languages, landscapes, and histories.“If memory is a museum / what happens if it’s ransacked?” the speaker asks, navigating the weight of family inheritance, the fractures of language, and the search for belonging. At its core, sipèstisyon is a meditation on the ghosts we carry, the stories we inherit, and the ways in which we transform pain into something sacred.
—Diannely Antigua, author of Good Monster
Mckendy Fils-Aimé is a poet of exquisite craft, compassion, and charisma. He has somehow managed to transcend the borders of the page and summon poetry that can follows us around. In sipèstisyon, he asks if we’ve ever used up a ration of love, and if so, how was it restored? He wants to know if joy can be kept alive in music, whether grief is worth the poems it will inspire, and if there’s any part of our lives we would cast into fire that we might lose our fear of dreaming. Trust him to stay with you while you consider your answers. There’s room in this book to lay down; he’s brought rain and figs, he’s got sunlight by the handful.
—Brendan Constantine, author of The Opposites Game
Mckendy dares to speak an honest and incisive language in his debut collection, sipèstisyon. Every line of sipèstisyon is steaming like a bowl of bouyon tète pwason, nourishing and warming the reader's bones as he breaks a triumvirate of generational trauma, shame, and the language of imperialism. “Shame, you bastard of a barber/ I know what I want/ take it all off.” I know what I want just as well, to lose myself in this work, and let Mckendy’s pen shear me down to the follicle.
—Gregory Smith, author of Profligate Angel
sipèstisyon
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what we sacrificed
the fire pit always looks the same
in the dream: a stubborn sun
we orbit towards—drawn by gravity
or guilt—away from the house my parents built.
my father throws his hands into the flame—
the sacked flint of his fists—
alongside the furniture pieces turned javelins
meant for my mother’s skull.
my mother throws in a photo album
of other men (infidelity is a kind
of gasoline too) & a set of new house keys.
i throw in a wedding ring & a bag
full of index fingers. i throw in letters
to a future self & a box of matchsticks.
it's hard to tell when a flame is working
what is memory & what is kindling.
About the book
sipèstisyon unflinchingly navigates generational trauma, migration, and spirituality. In this powerful debut, Haitian-American poet Mckendy Fils-Aimé examines wounds left by abuse, familial estrangement, and racial violence. Through the lens of Haitian superstitions, sipèstisyon explores the imperfect and non-linear nature of healing. These poems don’t pretend that moving on is as simple as moving on. They know that mending a wound requires understanding its shape and origin and that confrontation is sometimes necessary. In each poem, sipèstisyon asks which is louder: the sound of our ache or the call to forgive?
About the author
MCKENDY FILS-AIMÉ is a New England based Haitian American poet, organizer, and teaching artist. He has received fellowships from Callaloo, Cave Canem, The Watering Hole, CantoMundo, and Periplus. Over the span of nearly two decades, Mckendy has represented New England in several regional and national poetry slams, making numerous semi-final and final stage appearances. Mckendy’s work has been featured or is forthcoming in Best New Poets, Adroit, Muzzle, Obsidian, the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series, and elsewhere. sipèstisyon (YesYes Books, 2026) is his debut poetry collection.
