Don't Call Us Dead

Don't Call Us Dead is a poetry collection that confronts mortality, racism, and sexuality in America. The opening sequence imagines an afterlife for Black men who died from violence or AIDS. Smith's poems move between personal experiences as a queer Black man living with HIV and broader societal narratives about police brutality and systemic racism. The work incorporates both traditional poetic forms and experimental structures on the page. The collection shifts between rage and tenderness, addressing contemporary violence while making space for desire and hope. Through parallel themes of the body and American soil, Smith explores what it means to survive in a hostile landscape. These poems speak to current social movements while engaging with timeless questions about identity, death, and the possibility of transformation. The work demonstrates how poetry can function as both testament and prophecy.

Readers emphasize the raw emotional power and urgent political messaging in these poems about Black and queer identity, HIV, and police violence. Many note the collection's ability to balance grief with moments of joy and hope. Liked: - Vivid imagery and metaphors - Musical quality of the language - Accessibility despite complex themes - Strong opening sequence about police violence - Effective mix of personal and political topics Disliked: - Some found certain poems too abstract - A few readers struggled with the experimental formatting - Several mentioned emotional difficulty reading the more intense pieces Ratings: Goodreads: 4.4/5 (4,800+ ratings) Amazon: 4.7/5 (125+ ratings) Sample reader comment: "These poems punch you in the gut while making you marvel at their craft." - Goodreads reviewer "The imagery stays with you long after reading" appears frequently in reviews across platforms. Several poetry forums and book clubs cite it as one of their most discussed collections of 2017.

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🌟 Danez Smith became the youngest winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection when "Don't Call Us Dead" won in 2018 at age 29 📚 The collection opens with "summer, somewhere," a 32-page sequence imagining an afterlife for Black men killed by police violence 💫 Smith identifies as gender-neutral and uses they/them pronouns, bringing this perspective into their exploration of identity throughout the collection 🎭 Beyond their writing, Smith is a founding member of the Dark Noise Collective and has been featured on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert 🏆 The book was a finalist for the National Book Award in Poetry and won the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry in 2018