Counting Descent [Paperback]

Black Harvard Doctorate in Poetics launches poetry that explores modern blackness.

Clint Smith's debut poetry collection, Counting Descent, is a coming of age story that seeks to complicate our conception of lineage and tradition. Smith explores the cognitive dissonance that results from belonging to a community that unapologetically celebrates black humanity while living in a world that often renders blackness a caricature of fear. His poems move fluidly across personal and political histories, all the while reflecting on the social construction of our lived experiences. Smith brings the reader on a powerful journey forcing us to reflect on all that we learn growing up, and all that we seek to unlearn moving forward.

- Winner, 2017 Black Caucus of the American Library Association Literary Award

- Finalist, 2017 NAACP Image Awards

- 2017 'One Book One New Orleans' Book SelectionFrom "How to Fight":
...
Spelling bees were a battleground
where teachers trained me
to wield language as a
tool & fist & weapon & warning
to those who would rather
make an outline out of me."So many of these poems just blow me away. Incredibly beautiful and powerful." Michelle Alexander, Author of The New Jim Crow"Counting Descent is a tightly-woven collection of poems whose pages act like an invitation to New Orleans, to the spades' table, to mom's kitchen, to the kiss on a woman's wrist, to conversations with hydrants and cicadas..."Elizabeth Acevedo"These poems shimmer with revelatory intensity, approaching us from all sides to immerse us in the America that America so often forgets."Gregory Pardlo