Hood Criatura, féi iká shumarí

“what a coincidence that all things ugly tossed into folklore out of fear scratch their way out of myth”

In this stunning debut collection, Inglewood-raised poet féi iká shumarí weaves an intricate latticework of stories in the betwixt and between. Hood Criatura explores the intersections of trans and queer resilience, citizenship and belonging, and resistance against gentrification that threatens both city and the body. shumarí’s poems take us through a coming-of-age story that delineates the existential wars of gender, race, sexuality, and im/migration, as well as the pains and joys that bind communities, family, and love. In a world that seeks to simplify and reduce the self to binary boundaries, Hood Criatura serves as a reminder of what it means to exist unbounded, to claim all of the multitudes within us that make us who we are. Masterfully juxtaposed in myriad poetic forms throughout the book, these poems are a love letter to all of us who exist within liminal spaces and who dare to claim one’s true self.

“You think you’re ready for this? féi iká shumarí is the american dream in the second before it blooms into nightmare—this intuitive poet’s existence, their muscular root, bellows the questions many of us have spent lifetimes avoiding. And here, finally, is our reckoning—poems that backhand us with the restlessness of the actual world, a world in which a human being can be deemed illegal or have their body, or the way that body loves, under the blunt jurisdiction of the state. These undaunted stanzas do not exist to teach—it’s much too late for that—they exist to devastate. Then you’ll know if you were ready.”—Patricia Smith, Pulitzer Prize finalist for Incendiary Art and author of numerous works.

“féi iká shumarí is a necessary poet whose voice contains both the tenderness of love and a searing scrutiny of the forces that shape love. In this innovative debut that examines the nationalistic impulses of citizenship against heteronormative functions of gender identity, shumarí adeptly dismantles the borders within and outside the body. This book demonstrates that there are multiple ways of coming out just as there are multiple ways of loving, of honoring the sacrifices of our parents, and reconstructing the myths of the past which inform our present. I was greatly moved by the candor with which shumarí unravels her desires, wants, and suffering. ‘If this poem was a new body I’d sing every day; / if it weren’t for the wounded deer I’ve become I’d run wild,’ shumarí writes. I am grateful for these poem’s declarations of self-love, discovery, and for the songs that continue long after I’ve put the book down.”—Marcelo Hernandez Castillo, author of Cenzontle & Children of the Land