New Releases by Lucille Clifton

With a powerful introduction by Ross Gay and a moving afterword by Sidney Clifton, this special anniversary edition of The Book of Light offers new meditations and insights on one of the most beloved voices of the 20th century. Though The Book of Light opens with thirty-nine names for light, we soon learn the most meaningful name is Lucille—daughter, mother, proud Black woman. Known for her ability to convey multitudes in few words, Clifton writes into the shadows—her father’s violations, a Black neighborhood bombed, death, loss—all while illuminating the full spectrum of human emotion: grief and celebration, anger and joy, empowerment and so much grace. A meeting place of myth and the Divine, The Book of Light exists “between starshine and clay” as Clifton’s personas allow us to bear the world’s weight with Atlas and witness conversations between Lucifer and God. While names and dates mark this text as a social commentary responding to her time, it is haunting how easily this collection serves as a political palimpsest of today. We leave these poems inspired—Clifton shows us Superman is not our hero. Our hero is the Black female narrator who decides to live. And what a life she creates! “Won’t you celebrate with me?”

A moving family biography in which the poet traces her family history back through Jim Crow, the slave trade, and all the way to the women of the Dahomey people in West Africa. Buffalo, New York. A father’s funeral. Memory. In Generations, Lucille Clifton’s formidable poetic gift emerges in prose, giving us a memoir of stark and profound beauty. Her story focuses on the lives of the Sayles family: Caroline, “born among the Dahomey people in 1822,” who walked north from New Orleans to Virginia in 1830 when she was eight years old; Lucy, the first black woman to be hanged in Virginia; and Gene, born with a withered arm, the son of a carpetbagger and the author’s grandmother. Clifton tells us about the life of an African American family through slavery and hard times and beyond, the death of her father and grandmother, but also all the life and love and triumph that came before and remains even now. Generations is a powerful work of determination and affirmation. “I look at my husband,” Clifton writes, “and my children and I feel the Dahomey women gathering in my bones.”

"A series of poems drawn from various collections published throughout the 40-year career of American poet Lucille Clifton"--

Winner of the 2013 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Poetry "The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965-2010 may be the most important book of poetry to appear in years."--Publishers Weekly "All poetry readers will want to own this book; almost everything is in it."--Publishers Weekly "If you only read one poetry book in 2012, The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton ought to be it."—NPR "The ''Collected Clifton'' is a gift, not just for her fans...but for all of us."--The Washington Post "The love readers feel for Lucille Clifton—both the woman and her poetry—is constant and deeply felt. The lines that surface most frequently in praise of her work and her person are moving declarations of racial pride, courage, steadfastness."—Toni Morrison, from the Foreword The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965–2010 combines all eleven of Lucille Clifton''s published collections with more than fifty previously unpublished poems. The unpublished poems feature early poems from 1965–1969, a collection-in-progress titled the book of days (2008), and a poignant selection of final poems. An insightful foreword by Nobel Prize–winning author Toni Morrison and comprehensive afterword by noted poet Kevin Young frames Clifton''s lifetime body of work, providing the definitive statement about this major America poet''s career. On February 13, 2010, the poetry world lost one of its most distinguished members with the passing of Lucille Clifton. In the last year of her life, she was named the first African American woman to receive the $100,000 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize honoring a US poet whose "lifetime accomplishments warrant extraordinary recognition," and was posthumously awarded the Robert Frost Medal for lifetime achievement from the Poetry Society of America. "mother-tongue: to man-kind" (from the unpublished the book of days): all that I am asking is that you see me as something more than a common occurrence, more than a woman in her ordinary skin.

Finalist for the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry A landmark collection by National Book Award-winning poet Lucille Clifton, Good Woman: Poems and a Memoir 1969-1980 includes the four poetry collections that launched Clifton’s career—Good Times, Good News About the Earth, An Ordinary Woman, and Two-Headed Woman—as well as her haunting prose memoir, Generations. In honor of the 30th anniversary of Lucille Clifton''s Pulitzer Prize-nominated poetry collection and memoir, Good Woman is now available for the first time as a deluxe eBook edition. Enhanced with previously unpublished photographs from the Lucille Clifton Estate and a special foreword by Aracelis Girmay, this eBook is a must-have for longtime Clifton fans and newcomers alike.

There is nothing Tee enjoys more than sitting out on the porch with her great-greatmother, listening to the fascinating stories about the lucky stone. Shiny and black as night, it brought good fortune to each of its owners for over one hundred years. First it helped Mandy, a runaway slave, win her freedom. Then it saved Vashti from death by lightning at a prayer meeting. And it even saved Tee''s great-grandmother from the ferocious dancing dog and helped her meet her husband. Now Tee can''t help wondering what the old stone has in store for her. She certainly could use some luck on Valentine''s Day. But the lucky stone doesn''t belong to Tee. How can her wish come true?

The long-awaited tenth collection of poetry from the Shelley Memorial Prize-winning poet Lucille Clifton.

"Find a penny on New Year''s Day with your birthday year on it, and you can make three wishes on it and the wishes will come true! It happened to me," explains Nobie. As each of Nobie''s wishes comes true, she discovers the really important things in life in this story of faith and friendship.

Everett Anderson has a difficult time coming to terms with his grief after his father dies.

Sonora laments the peculiarities of her life.

When her five-year-old brother decides to run away from home, Johnny is glad--at first.

A little black boy tries to find out where his people are from.

Two skeptical city boys set out to find spring which they''ve heard is "just around the corner."