Somebody Give This Heart a Pen

October 19, 2020
In her debut poetry collection, Thakur explores love, family, and the challenges and joys of being a Black woman in contemporary Britain. An opening poem describes the regenerative process of the heart (“the building, the breaking, the learning and recreating”), which Thakur likens to creating a book. The remaining pages explore those concepts in poems divided into four steps: grow, wait, break, and grow again. Thakur delves into the intimacies of romantic love, through the first moments of intrigue (“I’m so certain light lives behind your lips”) to the devastation of a relationship’s collapse: “I wake, flooded in a dream of you.” Though some of the poems lean on broad, familiar metaphors, Thakur embraces that connective power, welcoming readers to see themselves in the emotions her narrator expresses. The collection is most powerful in its odes to Black girlhood: “Little black girl, my heart thrives in the stride of your halo.” Offering particular nourishment for young Black women, this raw, heartfelt collection will resonate with all readers seeking a lyrical meditation on the journey to heal from heartache. Ages 14–up.