apparitions

"These poems are eccentric in the most literal sense, Raha’s writing pushing at the edges of the mainstream of poetry, presenting a punk, transfeminist revision of poetic norms. . . apparitions (nines) deserves to be read—for its insights and newness, and the studs of pleasure it doles out."

—Lou Selfridge, Frieze 

“Welcome the poems that split us open, ‘frequencies/ to be removed from the air.’ Nat Raha has sharpened the lines, their serrated letters leaving us marked, poems to touch again on the skin, feel our doom undo its direction for enduring solidarity; the best love.”

—CAConrad

“Describing and defying the murder of experimental gathering requires and allows syntactic variety, paratactic flare. What you can hear in Nat’s nonet9 is dressed to kill, extravagant, and spare. For all we’ve ever wanted, all we’ve ever needed is a weapon to share. In apparations / this is unconcealed, & open,, && laid bare. Seeing that we haven’t just been seeing things is rare”

—Fred Moten

“Like a sculptor releasing the figure from the stone, Nat Raha breaks and chips away at language to liberate and unleash the hidden, layered meanings that nest within the anguish that is english. Through the inherent restraint of the niner, apparitions both complicates and clarifies the contesting and lasting forces of empire, allowing us to “re/assemble[d] our/affections and solidarities/our cracked, efflorescent hands.”

—m. nourbeSe philip

“Get through the day. There’s no night. Repeat. An “excruciate living” manifests itself in lines that fold on the bias of a diagonal mark, dots that conjoin to form a briefly stable square before disintegrating again. In apparitions, syntax is both magnified and contracted, a profoundly moving somatic register. A duplicate semi- colon makes the line shake. This is a book that imagines (and refuses to imagine) survival, in spaces that serrate recollection, that don’t require their occupants to be embodied subjects. Nat Raha is a brilliant writer who upholds and generates incompleteness as both ethics and terrain. Book as scream. Book as frequency. Here, in the book, we might “remember what we live.” Not how.”

—Bhanu Kapil

"The poems register and speak to/against/beyond structural inequality, harm and racist violence. Raha’s niners also speak of grief, political organizing, mutual aid and the relationships that support resistance and survival."
—Andrea Quaid, Annulet

"An addictive, transformative book you won’t want to put down. . . Not a single poem drags its feet, as strange, voiced turns of phrase illuminate the visually sparse pages and give voice to facets of language not often explored."
—Turi Sioson, ONLY POEMS

"[Raha] writes small moments, accumulated and electrified, punctuated and piercing. . . accumulations provide a layering effect across her narratives around social upheavals, human requirements and demanding, despite capitalism, that humans treat each other with at least a modicum of respect and dignity."

—rob mclennan, rob mclennan's blog