A debut collection that draws on the poet's Iranian heritage to process life-altering loss and grief.
Darius Atefat-Peckham's debut poetry collection follows a boy's coming of age in the aftermath of a car accident that took the lives of both his mother and brother. Through these poems, Atefat-Peckham constructs a language for grief that is porous and revelatory, spoken assuredly across the imagination, bridging time and space, and creating a reciprocal haunting between the living and the dead.
Inspired by the Persian epic The Book of Kings, the Sufi mystic poetry of Rumi, and his mother's poetry, these poems form a path of connection between the author and his Iranian heritage. Book of Kin interrogates what it means to exist between cultures, to be a survivor of tragedy, to practice love and joy toward one's beloveds, and to hope for greater connection through poems that wade through time and memory "like so many fish spreading swimming in the green-blue."
Book of Kin won the 2023 Autumn House Poetry Prize.
Industry Reviews
"I'm overwhelmed by the love and care in the gorgeous Book of Kin by Atefat-Peckham. These immensely tender, radiant poems sing love for a mother, a father, a brother, language, the courageous women of Iran, and memory itself. 'You are your own / son. North is north, wherever/you are.' Fluid and fluent, humble and ever-seeking, Atefat-Peckham welcomes us all into a nest that contains everything humans can live. He gives us room." -- Naomi Shihab Nye, author of "Grace Notes"
"Praise for Atefat-Peckham's debut poetry collection Book of Kin and its compelling, profound, and worldly poems! With exquisite language and soulful reflections, each poem unfurls a kaleidoscope of experiences. An exploration of grief and cultural identity emerges, walking the line between connection and belonging as the speaker examines the nature of loss. Atefat-Peckham is a bright, bright light, and this collection is simply beautiful." -- January Gill O'Neil, judge of the 2023 Autumn House Poetry Prize
"How do we honor those we love? How do we grieve those we barely knew? How do we muster the capacity to sing joy and even praise in a world riddled with violence? In poems at once intimate and epic, Atefat-Peckham insists that we listen, that we allow ourselves to need, that we seek beloveds everywhere and in everything. Book of Kin is a revelation and a consolation-an ecstatic elegy, and a luminous incantation." -- Tracy K. Smith, author of "Such Color: New and Selected Poems" and "Life on Mars"
"'My mother lived, maybe, / half the life of a blueberry / bush, crown jewel of / Iran, first masterpiece / of god, eyes, dark / sheen before ruin.' This is a son's book, a dire and loving book spoken from deep inside a legacy of grief and dislocation, in a voice exiled from the mother, the mother tongue and the mother country, reaching toward all three in lyrics fueled in equal measure by fury and devotion." -- Mark Doty, author of "Deep Lane"
