Black ≠ Inferior

Short but very sharp poetry collection celebrating Blackness and condemning anti-Black racism. I wish this collection had more work included, and I wish it was a little more expansive in scope. But the poems included are powerful and important, and Akinyemi's voice is much needed.

This book was well written and a powerful collection of poetry. I really recommend it to everyone. Many thanks to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for providing me this copy of this amazing book!

As usual, Akinyemi nailed his deeply political poetry, with the perfect ratio between angry and appreciative. This is how political poetry should be, I can’t help but think whenever I read his work: it’s complete, showing both hatred and love. The anger towards society, towards the oppression is there, as it should, but so is the appreciation of those who are oppressed, whose beauty in every singular way is portrayed wonderfully, with care.

Reading Akinyemi’s work feels like fierce protection, a sentiment that has a basis on hating what you’re facing and loving what’s behind you, the things and people you have a duty, a desire to protect.

There’s also some beauty in the way that those political poems aren’t implied: ‘black lives matter’ is written very explicitly in several poems, and the messages are very direct, while still being a poetic message full of metaphors.

While “A Booktiful Love”, another poetry work by Akinyemi, has a few works about individual struggles, not only political, social ones, this book is exclusively about the latter. This book is a protest, mainly against racism, but you can also find one poem or another about sexism.

There are words and verses that feel just like raw power, such as:

"Do not cry for me, for though I may be gone,
my words make me immortal.
I’m a god; gods don’t die!"

It’s as striking as lightning, as strong as stone, and I could go on with a dozen other metaphors, but it won’t compare with the sensation of reading this excerpt yourself. I highly recommend this book if you’re going through a reading slump, since the poems are short and straightforward, though still lyrical.

Tolu A. Akinyemi shared story, identity, and experience along the powerful accordances of poetry. There is much to enjoy and appreciate about this work, and also much to learn.