Some of Us Did Not Die: New and Selected Essays of June Jordan, by June Jordan.

Where I learned a lot of what I needed to about June Jordan.

This book is extremely dense and full of so many points of view on so many different topics, but each of the points and each of the topics are critical and applicable to the time that is today (which is… something when you consider how “progressive” we are). These points and topics are also brilliant, and June Jordan’s melody of language is intoxicating. Per usual, I read several of the paragraphs two and three times in a futile attempt at memorization because the way she made me see her mind was just that good.

Favorite essays from within: Requiem for the Champ; Waking Up in the Middle of Some American Dream; Can I Get a Witness?; Ruth and Naomi, David and Jonathan; Problems of Language in a Democratic State; Report from the Bahamas; and Civil Wars.

Purchase here.

It’s 12:32AM a month (I think?) after reading this book, and I’m in my bed obsessing over it again. This quote: And then, as often as possible, at night, I want and I need an ostensible stranger who will lie beside me becoming someone I love at least as much as I love myself. This feeling. Her architecture of thought. It’s all running through me faster tonight for some reason. One of my favorites of all time.