Poetry. African and African American Studies. THE GIVING OF PEARS, winner of the 2008 Hudson Prize, is Abayomi Animashaun's debut poetry collection. Animashaun has said this about the book: "In writing these poems, I saw the page as a sort of living room, where I could go to have a party. And, of course, everyone was welcome: To drink wine. Join the conga line. Do a shimmy or cha-cha. Kiss in the manner of Zebras. Sumo wrestle guavas. Or even swing from rafters with giraffes. I wasn't at all surprised when Tomatoes, Fish; Grapes, Goats, Thieves; Mohammed, Rilke, The Unseen; and so many others showed up for the party. Since each guest was allowed to do as he/she pleased. Goats removed their hooves, their hides, and wept like women. Women, in turn, tried on hides, hooves, and stared like goats. Stones imagined themselves naked. Kettles became villages. The Unseen, continued as they always have—conducting their own festivals and singing their own songs..."

The Giving of Pears

Literature & Fiction

Animashaun, Abayomi

Poetry

Black Lawrence Press

Literary Nonfiction. Poetry. Poetry manuals, at their most essential, are aimed at demystifying aspects of poetry, in order to make poetry less daunting?especially for beginner poets. Such manuals are also reminders that poetry itself is a discipline with a landscape and a history. FAR VILLAGES builds on the body of work in this tradition by bringing a number of established and emerging poets together in a single volume to welcome new and beginner poets to the art of poetry, its craft, and the long journey within it. Contributors to this anthology include Abayomi Animashaun, Jose Araguz, Stacey Balkun, Chaun Ballard, Christine Beck, David Bergman, Marina Blitshteyn, Michelle Bonczek, DanielBosch, Zoe Brigley, Aaron Brown, Guillermo Cancio-Bello, Rob Carney, Kelly Cherry, Michael Collins, Tasha Cotter, Rishi Dastidar, Noah Davis, Victoria L. Davis, Todd Fleming Davis, Jaydn DeWald, Melanie Faith, Jenny Ferguson, Kyle Flak, Leonard Franzen, Robbie Gamble, John Guzlowski, David Harris, Duane L. Herrmann, Jon Hoel, Natalie Homer, Kathryn Hummel, Ashton Kamburoff, Laura Kaminski, C. Kubasta, John Langfeld, Joan Leotta, Tanis MacDonald, David Maduli, Katie Manning, Michael Martin, Jason McCall, Nathan McClain, J.G. McClure, Megan Merchant, Amy Miller, Norman Minnick, Jennifer Moore, James B. Nicola, Dike Okoro, Stephen Page, Gillian Parrish, Barbara Perry, Kevin Pilkington, Darby Price, Jessamine Price, Michael Rather, Jr., Nancy Reddy, Christine Riddle, John Robinson, Diana Rosen, Helen Ruggieri, Claudia Savage, Nancy Scott, David Shumate, Linda Simone, Tara Skurtu, Carol Smallwood, Emily Stoddard, WhitneySweet, Thom Tammaro, Sophia Terazawa, Kari Treese, J.S. Watts, Kari Wergeland, and Ben White.

Far Villages: Welcome Essays for New & Beginner Poets

History & Criticism

Literary Nonfiction. Essays. Poetry. Introduction by Kazim Ali. No two immigrant poets are the same. Even those from the same country don't necessarily answer to the same poetics or, for that matter, speak to the same concerns. How, then, do immigrant poets in America define themselves? How do they see and position themselves within the landscape of American poetry or the poetic traditions of their own country? Who might they consider their influences? Answers to these questions are complex, individual, and varied, as seen with the essays included in this anthology. Contributors: Zubair Ahmed, Kazim Ali, Abayomi Animashaun, Lisa Birman, Ewa Chrusciel, Kwame Dawes, Michael Dumanis, Megan Fernandes, Cristián Flores García, Danielle Legros Georges, Rigoberto González, Maria Victoria A. Grageda-Smith, Andrei Guruianu, Piotr Gwiazda, Fady Joudah, Pauline Kaldas, Ilya Kaminsky, Vandana Khanna, Jee Leong Koh, Vasyl Makhno, Gerardo Pacheco Matus, David McLoghlin, Majid Naficy, Marilène Phipps- Kettlewell, Shabnam Piryaei, Barbara Jane Reyes, José Antonio Rodríguez, Matthew Shenoda, Sun Yung Shin, Anis Shivani, Ocean Vuong, and Sholeh Volpé. "Nerval once said that you ought to travel so much that even your home becomes strange to you, but I have no hope other than the opposite—that is to say: once you cross borders often enough you find really that every place must be somehow home. The poets collected here testify, both in these statements and in their own work, that such a home is possible."—Kazim Ali, from the Introduction "The range of voices and the experiences those voices represent in OTHERS WILL ENTER THE GATES: IMMIGRANT POETS ON POETRY, INFLUENCES, AND WRITING IN AMERICA provide the reader with an entrance into other worlds and other ways of seeing and walking in those worlds. Our notions of identity, of transition and transformation, of the translation of language and culture, of the very idea of documenting who or what a person fundamentally is, are called into question by these probing and provocative essays. This is a striking and essential collection, one in which the reader vicariously becomes an immigrant of sorts, allowed to pass over personal and national borders, ferried along by the beautiful and vital prose of some of the finest poets working in the U.S. today."—Todd Davis "OTHERS WILL ENTER THE GATES is a timely and necessary collection and to say that it is thought- provoking and versatile is an understatement. I urge everyone who cares about and loves the exiled and immigrant voices that constantly provide the new blood that keeps contemporary American Poetry lively and exciting to read and share this book, and to the teachers I say please don't miss out on this great opportunity to use this wonderful collection in your courses."—Virgil Suárez "Each time I open this book, each time I follow one of these fine poets through another gate in this country of a thousand gates, I feel like an immigrant again, realigned with my own Huguenot ancestors fleeing the religious tyrannies of France three centuries ago. To read these essays is to have your faith in the poetic future of this land restored, over and over again."—David Shumate "OTHERS WILL ENTER THE GATES is a multilayered exploration by writers of different generations and backgrounds that passionately offers an urgent and daring insight into America's ever-expanding literature on the immigrant experience..."—Dike Okoro "The great irony and most fabulous beauty of this very real and readable collection of essays are testament to why poetry has lasted for tens of thousands of years. No matter one's circumstance, it's outlived everything—every economic theory, every political ideology. Poetry exists because it is the language for which we have no language. What do we do when we can't explain profound and genuine grief? What do we do when we can't articulate profound and genuine joy? These poets, like all poets, make poems."—Ralph Angel

Others Will Enter the Gates

United States

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Books by Animashaun, Abayomi

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Animashaun, Abayomi. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Giving of Pears

Far Villages: Welcome Essays for New & Beginner Poets

Others Will Enter the Gates