The thing about Myles is that their poems do this thing where they make me think of voices as parts of the body, as solid. In Masculinity Parable, voices keep changing, touching, drowning each other out—the voices of strangers, lovers, workers, futures, selves—like "bundles of string lights caught in my throat," which is to say tangled, lit, somehow more bright for being near to each other. This is a book about transness that knows being trans is about manyness. Masculinity Parable is a generous, funny, and lush account of learning how to allow beauty and terror both, always inside each other, on the bus, at the venue, in your head, and on the clock. I love Myles' poems because they insist, over and over, that the work of all love resides in that allowance, a daily practice of listening to both a thing and its opposite. Good poetry, I think, attunes me more to my own living among others, and this is very good poetry.
‘Maybe,’ Myles Taylor writes in this book that navigates gender, masculinity, labor, and capitalism, ‘my heart is literally too fucking big.’ I read that line and smiled wide. And nodded. And felt my own heart beat. This is a book with a big fucking heart, a book that complicates and clarifies what it means to be alive in a world where ‘no human is too good to wax poetic / about an orangepink cloud.’ Myles Taylor holds grief and goodness in the same poetic line. They lament what it means to live without an ‘equity of care’ in a body that deserves such care, and they—at the same time—celebrate a world where healing is still possible, where anything can be made into a dancefloor, where we can all still be surprised by love. This is poetry that really lives. It is poetry that makes me want to live. I needed that, really, and maybe you do, too. Sometimes we have to be reminded of tenderness, especially in a society that systematically removes it from our lives. Masculinity Parable reminds me of tenderness. It does that beautiful work. Read this book and let your heart grow big.
Myles will be touring to celebrate the release of Masculinity Parable. Tour dates can be found here:
12/2
2pm - GBH Outspoken Saturdays
Boston Public Library Newsfeed Cafe, Boston, MA
6pm - The Book Disco w/ QT Library
Forge Baking Co, Somerville, MA
12/5
Book Launch & Conversation with Arianna Monet
Virtual, Game Over Books
12/6
8pm - Book Release @ Boston Poetry Slam
The Cantab Lounge, Cambridge, MA
12/9
1pm - EmersonWRITES
Emerson College, Boston, MA
12/11
9pm - The Dirty Gerund
Ralph’s Rock Diner, Worcester, MA
12/14
8pm - T4T Readings
The Model, Allston, MA
12/20
Mill City Speaks
Coffee and Cotton, Lowell MA
12/22
NJ Renaissance
My Way Cafe, Long Branch, NJ
1/6
Bread + Roses Bookstore
Cape Cod, MA
1/18
8pm - ProvSlam
AS220, Providence, RI
1/20
2pm - Everyone Has A Voice
Brockton Public Library, Brockton, MA
1/27
5pm - Author Signing
Under the Umbrella Bookstore, Salt Lake City, UT
1/28
Greenhouse Effect Open Mic
Greenhouse Effect, Salt Lake City, UT
1/29
Salt Lake City Slam
Mark of the Beastro, Salt Lake City, UT
1/31
FlagSlam
Yogaert, Flagstaff, AZ
2/2
5pm - First Fridays Author Signing
Bright Side Bookshop, Flagstaff, AZ
2/5
Emerson Poetry Project
Emerson College, Boston, MA
2/15
Third Thursdays w/ Yena Sharma Purmasir & Katya Zinn
Brookline Booksmith, Brookline, MA