Books

Voices from Leimert Park: A Poetry Anthology

Edited by Shonda Buchanan

VOICES FROM LEIMERT PARK REDUX is a symphony of diverse voices echoing the collective heartbeat of a community. In 2006, Voices From Leimert Park revealed one of the best kept secrets of the Los Angeles literary scene: African-American and other writers of color were producing nationally known and respected poetry, fiction, and nonfiction within the Leimert Park literary community.

Fast-forward ten years, and although many of the older voices have moved on to literary and academic achievements, new voices have arisen beneath the sinew and tendon of soothsayers and wordsmiths whose legacy is traced back to the legendary Watts Writers Workshop.

Voices from Leimert Park Redux, again under the editorial direction of Shonda Buchanan, embraces these radical new voices, and then melds them with the well-seasoned tonality of Griots at home, on street corners, and in libraries. This new collection is as vibrant as the smell of patchouli on your skin and as honest as any James Baldwin quote, but certainly this one: “All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. All artists, if they are to survive, are forced, at last, to tell the whole story; to vomit the anguish up.”

Listen to the Voices from Leimert Park Redux and realize that you have just entered that safe place where truth is still being created with every honest breath.