9780889713833_cover Enlarge Cover
0 of 5
0 ratings
rated!
rated!
list price: $12.99
edition:eBook
also available: Paperback
category: Poetry
published: Oct 2020
ISBN:9780889713833
publisher: Nightwood Editions

it was never going to be okay

by jaye simpson

tagged: indigenous, lgbt, death
Description

it was never going to be okay is a collection of poetry and prose exploring the intimacies of understanding intergenerational trauma, Indigeneity and queerness, while addressing urban Indigenous diaspora and breaking down the limitations of sexual understanding as a trans woman. As a way to move from the linear timeline of healing and coming to terms with how trauma does not exist in subsequent happenings, it was never going to be okay tries to break down years of silence in simpson’s debut collection of poetry:

i am five

my sisters are saying boy

i do not know what the word means but—

i am bruised into knowing it: the blunt b,

the hollowness of the o, the blade of y

About the Author

jaye simpson (she/they) is an Oji-Cree Saulteaux Indigiqueer from the Sapotaweyak Cree Nation. simpson is a writer, advocate, and activist sharing their knowledge and lived experiences in hopes of creating utopia. Their first poetry collection, it was never going to be okay (Nightwood Editions, 2021) was shortlisted for the 2021 ReLit Award and the Writers' Trust of Canada Dayne Ogilvie Prize and won the 2021 Indigenous Voices Award for Published Poetry in English.

Awards
  • Winner, Indigenous Voices Award: Published Poetry in English
  • Short-listed, Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers
Editorial Reviews

jaye simpson’s it was never going to be okay is a symphony of unrelenting rage and undying hope that beckons to be heard, seen and held with the utmost care. In this stunning debut they speak truths to the complexities of the body, land and memory through an intimately structured and poignant cadence. This collection will leave you longing for more and, in the legacy of trans Indigenous literature, change lives.

— Arielle Twist, author of Disintegrate/Dissociate

jaye simpson debuts with a remarkable collection of words taking you through the poetics of desire, kinship and distinct feeling. This selection of work cements their necessary place within the literary canon of queer Indigenous script as a writer whose pivotal and articulate voice evokes that familiar sense of yearning, care and ancestral knowledge with every page.

— Justin Ducharme, co-editor of Hustling Verse: an Anthology of Sex Workers' Poetry

jaye simpson marshals a vast economy of images because their subject matter is as large as an entire country, as the colonial past, as structures of oppression and indifference that undermine Indigenous and trans livability. At the level of craft, simpson makes use of the codes of tragedy, polemic, autobiography and the lyric artfully and powerfully. By the book’s end, buoyed by its final beautiful and tender section, a kind of love letter to trans Indigenous peoples, one is called on to build a new world. In this way, jaye simpson's poetry is a vital artifact of a decolonial future!

— Billy-Ray Belcourt, 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize winner for This Wound Is a World

Buy this book at:

Buy the e-book:

X
Contacting facebook
Please wait...