Overview

In Steel Slides and Yellow Walls, Alicia Swain navigates the labyrinthine journey women undergo to form their identities. Through a feminist lens and distinctive voice, her collection veraciously portrays the trials that forge women into sagacious, resilient adults. From contemplation of how to balance mental health despite knowing what tribulations are sure to come, to the title poem's exploration of how traumatic memories can continue to haunt in the most unexpected situations, Swain offers a look at the diverse experiences that mold women into the tenacious beings they are.

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9781966369042

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Reviews

""In Alicia Swain's debut poetry collection, a woman's voice calls out of the darkness. With intelligence and precision she speaks-of her own trauma, yes, but also of the earth's, of our society's, of womankind's. Deft with metaphor and lyricism, Swain's poems conjure figures of fierce resolve, speaking against silence with courage. These poems are the sound of a soul pouring forth in order to make and remake a world. A moving first book."" -Colleen Abel, PhD, author of Remake and Deviants ""'The harbored rage is a necessity.' These six words from Swain's 'Breaking Silence' piece awaiting inside will be one of the many phrases that cling to your brain after reading her latest work, Steel Slides and Yellow Walls. It is a liberating, empowering and inspiring read in these dark, uncertain times we face as a society. Swain beautifully and intricately weaves stories of pain, anguish, hope, sacrifice and distrust into her prose, which is as witty and biting as it is heartbreaking and raw. From bodily autonomy to a parent's love to abuse and what it means to be a woman facing the systems built against them in today's world-no stone is left unturned. The brevity in each poem speaks volumes, each stanza strung together effortlessly. She takes you on a journey that ends in freedom, clarity and healing. But not before igniting a fire in you that has burned in her for some time."" -Amy David, journalist featured in RVA Magazine, the Henrico Citizen, Midlothian Lifestyle, GayRVA.com, and OutRVA ""In language both fresh and fierce, Alicia Swain's debut poetry collection Steel Slides and Yellow Walls takes the reader on a journey of violent revolution and evolution, a journey toward a young woman's rebirth after years of nearly cracking, nearly drowning. Our guide is a speaker who wrestles, challenges, talks back, and sometimes asks disturbing and ultimately unanswerable questions. These poems offer images of chilling transgressions, ask us to confront uncomfortable memories, witness bodies slammed, bumped, bruised, crushed, and violated. ""Alicia Swain refuses to apply 'lipstick / to beautify the ugliest experiences' (as she writes in '6 AM'). These poems sugarcoat nothing. And yet the collection's final poem, 'Progress, ' offers a lovely coda, tells us 'the death / of one purpose can be as beautiful as a birth, ' and offers hopeful imagery ('an aroma like red cedar, aged pine / desperate to embark on a new stage of life'). These poems show a writer learning about true love in all its forms, most notably self-love. They leave both speaker and reader moved and restored."" -Alison Condie Jaenicke, teaching professor and assistant director of Creative Writing for Penn State University English Department (Retired) ""Alicia Swain's Steel Slides and Yellow Walls is an emotionally powerful book of poetry that is balanced between brutal and beautiful. The evocative language used throughout the book pulls the reader in, making each poem more of a visceral experience than a simple reading. That being said, Swain's perspective is both approachable and accessible through the common language of emotion woven through her writing. We are not just observers of her perspective but are actively thrown into the middle of it."" -Chris Tucker, former educator and contributor to the Dictionary of Virginia Biography, a Library of Virginia Project

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