It has been a pleasure and a privilege to edit She Dances Among the Wildfires for Akili. Initially, this process was habitual. I sat myself at my desk—mug on the coaster beside me, laptop booting up, lamp tilted to avoid glare on my screen—to read the writings of a stranger. Editing can be rather clinical work, at first. I find myself approaching the poems of new clients (Barthes would be proud) as though they were written by a ghost. Then, as the words keep flowing, and my scroll-bar inches towards the keyboard, the poet is born. Behind the words, they grow hands, eyes, a heart, a mouth. Soon, I am reading the writings of somebody I feel I know.

That is the power of poetry, a power that Akili has so effectively harnessed. These poems give snapshots of her life, from the husband she has “been with since 1997”, to the devotion of her faith, to her complicated emotions around children—both born and perhaps-to-be. How can one summarise a lifetime in a book of no more than five-thousand words? Akili has done so. Though I have not had the delight of meeting her personally, it would be impossible to read She Dances Among the Wildfires and still consider her a stranger.

As her voice comes to the forefront, so do the many lived experiences that have shaped it. As she explains in her preface, Akili is a person with disabilities, a wife, a grandmother, a black woman, and so much more, not least an incredible poet. In this stunning collection, these identities shine and interact. They give a voice to so many, including those who are marginalised too often.

And so, these are poems that speak to us as women, mothers, wives, PWDs, disciples, and, most importantly: humans. Her subjects are all around us. They are the air we breathe, the language we speak and, in the case of Protozoan, the cells that give us life. Where her poems branch into tangential musings, they are always connected to the manuscript’s trunk (indeed, “like a paper-white birch” of possibilities). Their cumulative power is worth appreciating for yourself.

There are many rich images and themes that make up this body of work. Side-stepping the pitfalls of cliché, Akili instead presents us with such wonderful images as “dog-day cicadas”,  “the light of the daystar”, and “a soul like a strong brute”. She expertly wields a combination of exciting content, clever wordplay, and meticulous form, as in Monolith (Duplex). Throughout the collection, she deftly introduces an image, then comes back to it in a way which strikes us down, making us re-evaluate the subject completely. In the mirrored Monolith, our impression of each line changes even within the span of a stanza-break.

Poetry allows us to explore emotions that, often, prose cannot. In this collection, you will feel Akili’s heart break, just as strongly as if it were your own. You will feel red blood rising to your cheeks in anger, and find yourself tackling thought-provoking questions. I especially appreciated the collection’s sentiments of grief, indignance, injustice, and greed. She dares to be political, engaging with the world around her, such as in Watermelon Shoes. There are poems like Love, Andromeda that buoy you up, and poems like My Chernobyl that bring a profound heartache.

To conclude, I will say once more that this collection was a real joy to review. I find myself energised by the passion and the artistry within its pages. Working on Fiverr, I often encounter poets who have so much gold, so much that deserves to be screamed from the balcony or flown across the sky in a fluttering airplane banner. These poets approach me to help them polish their work, but whether they need some advice on punctuation placement, style, or metaphor, this makes them no less a poet. As Socrates himself once said, it is not wisdom that enables poets to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration. To use Akili’s lovely wildfire image—her voice is the fire, I simply tended it with a poker and admired its beautiful light.

Thank you, Akili, for trusting me with your work. And to the readers—I hope you take your time to savour this collection, and open yourself to its charms.

Kristen Mears