A review by jaduhluhdabooks
Side Notes from the Archivist: Poems by Anastacia-Renee

challenging emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

5.0

I think I may have read one of my top read did the year with this one. Anastacia-Reneé pricks at the most wounded parts of the soul with these stanzas. They craft and model brokenness is its rawest and most unfixable forms, just to remind readers that Black women have endured and continue to endure such brokenness and come out fuller, whole, and complete from it. It's a rarity that can't be held and had by all, it's the secret to the magic that is a Black woman and her ability to just be. 

I think I sat in these words for a long time and will continue to sit with them. I shed tears and I laughed because I felt so seen, so insanely understood. To hold and shoulder so much expectation, to fight battles that if aren't fought by me, by Black women, they will never get resolved and we will unjustly suffer. 

I am moved and heard with and by these words. I am thankful to have sat in them and learned and been known by them.