Acts of Resistance: Essential Essays, Archival Encounters, and New Poems

by Cheryl Clarke

These times need urgently Cheryl Clarke and her brilliant mind and words. Clarke’ s sharp, clear-eyed, forceful, and poetic essays offer readers both balm and provocation to action— and they continue to resonate in current political landscape. Clarke is a towering figure in the worlds of poetry, feminist and queer theory, and lesbian, feminist, and queer communities. She has been writing and thinking with and in her communities for over fifty years. Her work is prescient, classic, and timeless. Acts of Resistance gather Clarke’ s most beloved essays alongside archival finds and recent poems. Many of Clarke’ s most influential essays, including “ Lesbianism: an Act of Resistance” and “ The Failure to Transform: Homophobia in the Black Community,” first appeared in landmark publications such as This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color (1981) and Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology (1983). These essays and others defined generations of lesbian, feminist, and queer thinkers, writers and activists. Discover— or revisit— the inimitable Cheryl Clarke through Acts of Resistance.

Genres: Poetry

200 pages, Paperback

Published May 19, 2026

About the author

Cheryl L. Clarke is a lesbian poet, essayist, educator and a Black feminist community activist: she lives in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Hobart, New York. With her life partner, Barbara Balliet, she is co-owner of Bleinheim Hill Books, a used and rare bookstore in Hobart.