(At) Wrist

Author: Tacey M. Atsitty

Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press (2023)

Tacey M. Atsitty melds inherited forms such as the sonnet with her Diné and religious experiences to boldly and beautifully reveal a love that can last for eternity. Celebrating and examining the depth and range of her relationships with men, Atsitty tenderly shares experiences of being taught to fish by her father, and, in other poems, reveals intimate moments of burgeoning romantic love with vulnerability and honesty. Grounded in a world both old and constantly remade, she reminds us that it is only by risking everything that we can receive more than we ever imagined.

“(At) Wrist lifts and sways with loss, praise, gratitude, intimacy, love, and grief—all that makes us human—both earthly and divine—as a piercing echo song of the natural world. Atsitty sings, ‘The wind / can only lift so much with its song: / snow is a blessing; its color / amplifies silence, so you can hear / every crunch or offering of self.’ I gather strength as the collarbones, wrists, veins, ankles, and soles of feet of this human body hold me together as delicately and powerfully as the creeks, canyons, glacier stones, and tree bones. Here, I’m humbled by a great sense of oneness and endurance, now as in the past, when ‘we rushed like rain to meet / along the ridges of the Chuskas.’ Thank you, Tacey Atsitty, for this star choir of beauty.”

–Layli Long Soldier