Uprising / Alzamiento by Lisbeth Coiman

“Lisbeth Coiman is a dazzling new voice. With tender rage, she excavates what it means to love and grieve a homeland.”

–Ariel Gore is the author of Hexing the Patriarchy: 26 Potions, Spells, and Magical Elixirs to Embolden the Resistance and F*ck Happiness.

“Lisbeth Coiman writes “Before I was born / A pristine future / streamed down from El Ávila tributaries” in the opening of her poem “El Guaire.” With these words and beyond, I am also taken to my point in history, the promise that we are all born into without knowing what’s to come, and how we are as individuals and as a collective, forced to reckon with a past that we are killing off to chase a promise of a better future. For immigrants, this carries a bigger weight, as we are both killers of self while our selves are so often the victims of a society that wants to kill us. Coiman’s collection is a deeply personal work that makes us revisit the guilts and the angers that we carry.”

–Chiwan Choi, author of The Yellow House

“UPRISING/ALZAMIENTO es un libro desgarrador, sincero y nostálgico.  Se entremezclan  los recuerdos de infancia,  el exilio y los retos  de la enfermedad mental. Es además un testimonio de vivir y narrar entre lenguas.”

 –Nathalie Bouzaglo, editora de Excesos del Cuerpo, y autora de Ficción Adulterada.

“Weaving history, current events, and personal narrative, Lisbeth Coiman takes us on a vivid exploration of what it means to rise up, as a Venezuelan both within the country and from afar, as an immigrant in new lands, and as a woman in patriarchal societies. Longing and loss mix with resolve and resilience as Coiman teaches us that uprisings are never simple or painless, but that they can be beautiful and are almost always necessary on the path towards a more just world. Uprisings / Alzamiento is that “despertador en tu mesa de noche // Una campana en tus oídos” (“clock on your beside table // ringing in your ears”) we all need right now, waking us up to the urgent need to take action in the face of injustice even when — especially when — we are afraid of what might come next.

–Li Yun Alvarado, author of Words or Water”