…This book is necessary because it changes you as you’re reading it. Language controls the way we see the world. Structural racism causes us to hold false arrogant definitions of words, using words to hide meaning instead of revealing truths. When Vivek Shraya examines racial and gender terms, confronting and exposing their histories and biases, we begin to see the world in a bigger more meaningful way. Those who have been erased are suddenly visible. Instead of feeling in any way confronted or humiliated by the words in this book, I felt illuminated and more large and free. And that is what poetry is supposed to do. That is why the best poetry is explosive and transforms the world. I guarantee you will immediately give this book away to someone else as soon as you are done. Because its words demand to be shared and spread.

-Author of Lullabies for Little Criminals & The Lonely Hearts Hotel recommends even this page is white for 49th Shelf.