Margaret Ray is pulling back the curtains on our societal performance of culture, guiding an exposing light to the daily performance that is life in a woman's body.
Ray's Good Grief, the Ground interrogates the everyday violences nonchalantly inflicted unto women through personal, political, and national lenses. Moving between adolescence and adulthood, Ray alternates between dark humor and heart-wrenching honesty to explore grief, anxiety, queer longing, girlhood, escape from an abusive relationship, and the dangers of lending language to a thing. With stunning wit and precision and attention, we see Ray show us what it is to be human: the mess of tenderness and darkness and animosity. Out of the heavy Florida dusk, out of peach juice and late-night swimming pool break-ins and glances across grocery store aisles come these completely captivating poems. In the words of Stephanie Burt: "Come and see. Take care. Dive in."
