Fossils by Kindra McDonald

With a lyrical heart and in near-conversational pace, Kindra McDonald resurrects what is not quite buried but threatens to be: Fossils, a world quickly disappearing from the digital sphere. Yet, nothing that a word can re-affirm is ever extinct. With affection for the made object—a kitchen utensil, a torn page, a telephone or letter, paper dolls, napkins—McDonald turns periphery into centerpiece, and we wonder, with both longing and pleasure, how we could have missed so much detail, and the beauty in it, why we do not ourselves revolve around the thrush, the map, the wedding favor…  How grateful we must be for this poet whose reverence for reality turns our senses into avenues of grace.

–Sofia Starnes, Author of The Consequence of Moonlight and other works.

Lovers of words will be lovers, too, of Kindra M. McDonald’s premier poetry collection, Fossils, which attests in nearly every poem to the imaginative, constructive power of language. Here can be found such a wild profusion of things and the wiggly, oily words that accompany them — “Words swell in my head making houses / to dwell in,” the poem “Compound” tells us before warning, “There is always a lie in believe.” I knew an old woman who counseled that I should be wary of the things I read because, as she so quaintly said, “Paper will lie down for anyone.” For McDonald, paper sits, lies, rolls over, and begs, and I am here for all of it.

–Karen Craigo, author of Passing Through Humansville and No More Milk (Sundress, 2018 and 2016)

Kindra McDonald‘s FOSSILS invites and channels excavation, concentration, and playfulness.  It’s an inspiring collection of exacting poems, calling us to task.  May we be worthy of these unearthings.

–Renée Olander, author of American Backlash