Blue Heat: A Portfolio of Poems and Drawings

by Alexis De Veaux

In 1984, Alexis De Veaux independently published and distributed Blue Heat. Mainstream publishing's interest in work by radical Black women was waning and De Veaux knew that she could reach women with the poems in Blue Heat directly---and she knew they needed these poems.Forty years later, Blue Heat is a Sapphic Classic from Sinister Wisdom with a stunning new introduction and guiding exercises for engaging the poems by Alexis Pauline Gumbs. In Blue Heat, De Veaux insists on survival and encourages risk-taking. In these poems, liberation is necessary, and there is only one means to achieve by creating a spark. Blue Heat brings intensity akin to the deepest, hottest part of a flame. Like its namesake, this poetry collection is flammable, igniting courage in its readers, achieving De Veaux goal of kindling a spirit of "power, joy and change" in the Black feminist communities.

Genres: Poetry

88 pages, Paperback

Published July 4, 2024

About the author

Alexis De Veaux is a black queer feminist independent scholar whose work is published in six languages and internationally known. She is the author of several books and her work is anthologized in numerous collections. The recipient of many honors and awards, Alexis penned Warrior Poet (WW Norton, 2004), the first biography of the late lesbian poet activist, Audre Lorde; and was tenured faculty at the University at Buffalo, Department of Women’s Studies, for more than twenty years, mentoring a new generation of interdisciplinary scholars of black, feminist, and queer studies. She has won two Lambda Literary Awards; one for her Lorde biography (2005) and one for her novel, Yabo (2015).

Reviews

[Sarah Cavar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Raw and permanently timely in an age of permanent war, de Veaux’s older poems reemerge at exactly the moment we need them lost. As a longtime fan of Gumbs, I was thrilled to pair these poems with her introductory essay and brilliant craft exercises — the two Alexises together are an incomparable pair of mirrors to themselves and to the Black lesbian lifeworlds they inhabit/ed.

[Jess B · Rating 4 out of 5]

love the variety of content matter these poems discussed all while relating to the black queer experience

[Kara Hisatake · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this collection of poems--see below--but it is one of those collections that I don't think I'll read again. It doesn't have the type of language that is typically going to stick with me. It gets at the everyday and revolutionary experience of Black women, and as the introduction written by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, De Veaux's Essence history is fascinating and I could definitely read more about that.

Memorable poems--

"Cheese Poem":
Good Lord: the government is giving something away.
The government is giving us
high blood pressure and processed cheese (34)

"In Any Language, Bread with Dignity":
granted:
you have to work at friendship
like you do any community
or garden
got to break through top soil
to whats underneath
plow and plant
get it: under your fingernails
in any language (36)

"Don't Panic I Said":
just because ronald reagan won
just because the congress is republican
because they may overturn brown v. the board of ed
because they may revoke the voter registration act
just because theyre weak
just because theyre stupid
don't panic:

jog
run
ride your bike/ consider a gun
do the rope
do the barbells
be firm
be fast
be ready
when they come. (50)

"Death of an Idol":
the truth is
we all trespass
without meaning
to
know your bottom line
then draw it
every love
has its fine clauses
and it dont pay
to speed read (63-64)


I particularly enjoy the writing exercises Gumbs includes in the back, like "New Body: New Life" -Write a love poem to one of your scars.

[Jasminum Mcmullen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The poems hit hard at injustice, soothe, and delight.