Plenty. by BeeLyn Naihiwet

These poems oscillate beautifully between observing the vast and the small. They often live in the metaphorical world of the eye and its power to capture, to name, to make real, and to erase. As Plenty reveals the uncertain power of sight and of the word, this collection reminds us of the enduring echo of a past that shifts under our gaze. This vibrant and multilayered collection meditates on the ache of love and its fluid capacity to nourish and destroy, like water. In one moment, we see the mirage of the one person’s salvation in another’s face. In the next moment, we see that same person gathered together, whole, through the power of her own recognition. These poems compel us to see ourselves and see each other anew.

–Natalie J. Graham, author of Begin with a Failed Body

In this fine first collection, BeeLyn Naihiwet offers us tender, unflinching poems that immerse us in experiences both personal and universal. Through her clear-eyed and compassionate observations on love and family, the poet provides us a map through the often-treacherous geography of the heart. The narrator of Plenty is one who fights courageously for relationship; accepts disappointment with fierce grace. In these exquisite poems, Naihiwet reveals she is more than enough as both a woman and poet: she is plenty.

–Joy Roulier Sawyer, author of Lifeguards and Tongues of Men and Angels

BeeLyn Naihiwet’s Plenty is full of gifts. It tells stories that take readers into an intimate moment or through a life’s journey rendered on a page. It is also peppered with short poems as quick as a koan that flash with brilliance, bright as well-cut gems. I appreciate Naihiwet’s voice—candid, clear and straightforward, yet full of range—humor, flirtation, anger, and longing. At the same time, a current of sound and craft ripples pleasantly underneath these poems, never distracting from the stories she tells, but adding an extra depth of pleasure. I came to look forward to the characters of her family who reappear, whether at a diner or from the dead, who help tell the larger story of a woman finding her place in “the northwestern corner / of a stable and racist Western Society,” a place within a family, with an intimate other, and in congruence with her self.

–Jayne Relaford Brown, author of My First Real Tree (FootHills) and “Finding Her Here”;  2019-2021 Poet Laureate of Berks County, Pennsylvania.