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Sacred Spells: Collected Works
The collected life-work of an interdisciplinary writer, performer, and central figure in the Black Gay cultural arts and AIDS movements.
In this timely collection of poetry, plays, fiction, and performance texts, Assotto Saint draws upon music and incantation, his Haitian heritage and a politics of liberation, to weave together a tapestry of literature that celebrates life in the face of death. Influential to contemporary writers such as Essex Hemphill, Marlon Riggs, and Melvin Dixon, Sacred Spells is Saint's crucial legacy–five hundred incandescent pages of painful, lyric writing that exemplifies the visceral, spiritual dimensions of an artistic practice that’s integral to Black and trans activist movements in the United States, both historic and present.
In this timely collection of poetry, plays, fiction, and performance texts, Assotto Saint draws upon music and incantation, his Haitian heritage and a politics of liberation, to weave together a tapestry of literature that celebrates life in the face of death. Influential to contemporary writers such as Essex Hemphill, Marlon Riggs, and Melvin Dixon, Sacred Spells is Saint's crucial legacy–five hundred incandescent pages of painful, lyric writing that exemplifies the visceral, spiritual dimensions of an artistic practice that’s integral to Black and trans activist movements in the United States, both historic and present.
363 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 1, 1996
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240 people want to read
About the author
Assotto Saint
4 books12 followersAssotto Saint (October 2, 1957 - June 29, 1994) was a Haitian-born American poet, publisher and performance artist, who was a key figure in LGBT and African-American art and literary culture of the 1980s and early 1990s.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 14, 2018
Overall I enjoyed this collection of poetry/short-stories/plays/song lyrics/essays (yes, all that!) written by the powerful writer/musician/dancer/activist (yes, all that!) Assotto Saint. I often have trouble with books that are so contemporaneous of a certain time period, this being the late 80s/early 90s, in the grips of the AIDs pandemic. However, there is such a powerful energy behind Saint's writing, which gives it a timeless feeling; writing that (literally) screams "hear me, muthafucka!" The bulk of this collection is poetry, the most powerful being the collection of poems written in the wake of his partner's AIDs related death. The rest was a bit inconsistent, but written in that bold and inextinguishable voice that permeates the entire work.
November 12, 2023
“DARE STAND BRAVE”
Assotto Saint was lost to AIDS on June 29, 1994 at the age of 36. Spells of a Voodoo Doll: The Poems, Fiction, Essays and Plays by Assotto Saint was published posthumously in 1996 and is now out of print. This collection is as compelling as Essex Hemphill’s Ceremonies: Prose and Poetry (1992; republished 2000). As with Hemphill’s writings, each piece by Saint is eminently readable and pulls you in from the first word. Saint won’t let you go until he is good and ready. The word “powerful” is barely adequate to describe Saint’s writing.
In the essay “Why I Write,” the first piece in Spells of a Voodoo Doll, Assotto Saint says, “My poems and plays are weapons and blessings that I use to liberate myself, to validate our realities as black gay men, and to elucidate the human struggle.” Saint’s weapons and blessings, his poems, stories, and essays, are often prophetic. They are as relevant to today’s america (just like Hemphill, Saint doesn’t capitalize America) as when they were originally composed. The following lines from “The March” could have been written in 2022:
let us
savagely charge a country
tempted by fascism
In “Shores,” Saint, an immigrant from Haiti to the United States, asks,
but do they know that our lady in the harbor
milks
us
immigrants
of
the
honey
in
our
blood
In “The Impossible Black Homosexual,” Saint takes no prisoners:
the one who on the day he nationalized as an american citizen
sat naked on the current president’s picture
& after he was finished
called the performance bushshit
Spells of a Voodoo Doll contains an unfortunately truncated version of Saint’s essay “Haiti: A Memory Journey” that deletes his account of returning to Haiti with Jan Holmgren, his partner, to see his father, whom he had never met. Saint’s famous lines appear in this essay: “Anytime one tries to take fragments of one’s personal mythology and make them understandable to the whole world, one reaches back to the past. It must be dreamed again.” “Haiti: A Memory Journey” is a fascinating introduction to Assotto Saint’s background.
AIDS permeates Saint’s writings. In his essay “Sacred Life: Art & AIDS,” Saint writes, “When Michael Evans died, a bag of ash, passed around.” The short story “Hooked for Life” continues the motif of ash. The story begins: “Yet, it had all come to this: a two-pound plastic bag filled with ash, bits of bones, fragments of teeth that didn’t completely burn. It had all come too quickly.” The story concludes: “Yet, it had all come to this: a two-pound plastic bag filled with a promise gone, scattered dreams—can’t even pick up the pieces—all too quick.”
The following lines from “The Quilt” express Saint’s rage at america’s cruel response to the AIDS crisis:
horrible holocaust imagery in this tragedy 100% futile
judeo-christianity infamy in this travesty 100% fatal
So do these lines from “The March”:
too young let us not fall like cattle
to redeem america’s
plaguing prejudices
let us not fall
let us
In “Shuffle Along,” Saint and Ian Holmgren are
life partners
trapped in the marathon
of disintegration
“A Lover’s Diary” meticulously describes the death of Holmgren and how Saint tries to survive afterward. The sorrow expressed in this poem is almost unbearable to experience, so I won’t quote from it. Holmgren was lost to AIDS on March 29, 1993, a little over a year before Saint died on June 29, 1994.
In “Why I Write,” Assotto Saint asserts that “our words indeed do triumph over silence, despair and death.” The legacy given to us by Saint and his writings is invaluable to gay culture. In today’s america, we need Assotto Saint’s voice more than ever.
The last three lines of “Leave or Die” succinctly capture the essence of Assotto Saint’s life and writings:
dare stand brave
remember this land is home
aim free
A new edition of Spells of a Voodoo Doll will be published by Nightboat Books in 2023.
Assotto Saint was lost to AIDS on June 29, 1994 at the age of 36. Spells of a Voodoo Doll: The Poems, Fiction, Essays and Plays by Assotto Saint was published posthumously in 1996 and is now out of print. This collection is as compelling as Essex Hemphill’s Ceremonies: Prose and Poetry (1992; republished 2000). As with Hemphill’s writings, each piece by Saint is eminently readable and pulls you in from the first word. Saint won’t let you go until he is good and ready. The word “powerful” is barely adequate to describe Saint’s writing.
In the essay “Why I Write,” the first piece in Spells of a Voodoo Doll, Assotto Saint says, “My poems and plays are weapons and blessings that I use to liberate myself, to validate our realities as black gay men, and to elucidate the human struggle.” Saint’s weapons and blessings, his poems, stories, and essays, are often prophetic. They are as relevant to today’s america (just like Hemphill, Saint doesn’t capitalize America) as when they were originally composed. The following lines from “The March” could have been written in 2022:
let us
savagely charge a country
tempted by fascism
In “Shores,” Saint, an immigrant from Haiti to the United States, asks,
but do they know that our lady in the harbor
milks
us
immigrants
of
the
honey
in
our
blood
In “The Impossible Black Homosexual,” Saint takes no prisoners:
the one who on the day he nationalized as an american citizen
sat naked on the current president’s picture
& after he was finished
called the performance bushshit
Spells of a Voodoo Doll contains an unfortunately truncated version of Saint’s essay “Haiti: A Memory Journey” that deletes his account of returning to Haiti with Jan Holmgren, his partner, to see his father, whom he had never met. Saint’s famous lines appear in this essay: “Anytime one tries to take fragments of one’s personal mythology and make them understandable to the whole world, one reaches back to the past. It must be dreamed again.” “Haiti: A Memory Journey” is a fascinating introduction to Assotto Saint’s background.
AIDS permeates Saint’s writings. In his essay “Sacred Life: Art & AIDS,” Saint writes, “When Michael Evans died, a bag of ash, passed around.” The short story “Hooked for Life” continues the motif of ash. The story begins: “Yet, it had all come to this: a two-pound plastic bag filled with ash, bits of bones, fragments of teeth that didn’t completely burn. It had all come too quickly.” The story concludes: “Yet, it had all come to this: a two-pound plastic bag filled with a promise gone, scattered dreams—can’t even pick up the pieces—all too quick.”
The following lines from “The Quilt” express Saint’s rage at america’s cruel response to the AIDS crisis:
horrible holocaust imagery in this tragedy 100% futile
judeo-christianity infamy in this travesty 100% fatal
So do these lines from “The March”:
too young let us not fall like cattle
to redeem america’s
plaguing prejudices
let us not fall
let us
In “Shuffle Along,” Saint and Ian Holmgren are
life partners
trapped in the marathon
of disintegration
“A Lover’s Diary” meticulously describes the death of Holmgren and how Saint tries to survive afterward. The sorrow expressed in this poem is almost unbearable to experience, so I won’t quote from it. Holmgren was lost to AIDS on March 29, 1993, a little over a year before Saint died on June 29, 1994.
In “Why I Write,” Assotto Saint asserts that “our words indeed do triumph over silence, despair and death.” The legacy given to us by Saint and his writings is invaluable to gay culture. In today’s america, we need Assotto Saint’s voice more than ever.
The last three lines of “Leave or Die” succinctly capture the essence of Assotto Saint’s life and writings:
dare stand brave
remember this land is home
aim free
A new edition of Spells of a Voodoo Doll will be published by Nightboat Books in 2023.
May 14, 2024
More people should know about Saint.
November 16, 2008
Beautiful book written by Saint who was a Haitian gay activist writter/playwrite who we lost to the aids epidemic. This anthology includes songs, essays, poetry, plays written by Assotto Saint throughout his life. I usually don't like poetry but love the poems and writting in this book. Includes is book "wishing for wings" about and dedicated to his partner who also passed away from aids. brought me to tears, some of the writting is about watching, and taking care of his partner in the last days of his (partner's) life. highly highly recomended
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews