Shirley Jones Luke

Odes of Us Shirley Jones Luke

This is a book of poetry by Boston-area teen poets, edited by two Boston area poets. All the writers in the book are BIPOC.

Flip through the pages of poems, written by Boston-area young people. Brave, potentially overlooked, brilliant wordsmiths who reveal what is on their minds and in their souls.

There is beauty in these pages.

Fierceness.

Edgy moments.

Love.

Contempt.

Admiration.

Some rage here and there, sometimes hidden behind a metaphor, sometimes not.

Mostly stuff you either didn't know about, or stuff you knew and forgot.

These kids didn't have to write these poems, they chose to. They didn't have to stick with this project over the course of more than a year, either.

Some of them are in college now.

Some of them are still in high school.

None of them wrote specifically about the pandemic, but it hovers in the background.

All of them wrote with their hearts.