Wingspan: Poems

by Kai Coggin

Kai's wings are wide open and soaring in her second poetry collection, WINGSPAN. A catalog of fight and flight through life, Kai invites her readers into the innermost parts, where wing tuft meets flesh, where flesh meets bone. WINGSPAN is a book of spirit, movement, mirrors, activism, love, and the fluttering song of a woman who is coming into her own beauty and beingness. Coggin's poetic measurement in words, WINGSPAN holds earth and infinity between its feather tips.

Genres: Poetry

216 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 2016

About the author

Kai Coggin (she/her) is the author of MINING FOR STARDUST (FlowerSong Press 2021), INCANDESCENT (Sibling Rivalry Press 2019), WINGSPAN (Golden Dragonfly Press 2016), and PERISCOPE HEART (Swimming with Elephants Publications 2014), as well as a spoken word album SILHOUETTE (2017). She is a queer woman of color who thinks Black Lives Matter, a teaching artist in poetry with the Arkansas Arts Council and Arkansas Learning Through the Arts, and the host of the longest running consecutive weekly open mic series in the country—Wednesday Night Poetry.

Recently awarded the 2021 Governor’s Arts Award and named “Best Poet in Arkansas” by the Arkansas Times, her fierce and powerful poetry has been nominated four times for The Pushcart Prize, as well as Bettering American Poetry 2015, and Best of the Net 2016, 2018, and 2021. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in POETRY, Cultural Weekly, SOLSTICE, Bellevue Literary Review, TAB, Entropy, SWWIM, Split This Rock, Sinister Wisdom, Lavender Review, Luna Luna, Blue Heron Review, Tupelo Press, West Trestle Review, and elsewhere. Coggin is Associate Editor at The Rise Up Review. She lives with her wife and their two adorable dogs in the valley of a small mountain in Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas.

Reviews

[H.A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written poetry collection! I particularly enjoyed the political poems they were so impactful and powerful really struck a chord. Also the spiritual ones were absolutely brilliantly executed and so gorgeous I really enjoyed the nature themes of sky, stars and earth. These were so visually compelling and easy to connect with, you could just see all of the exquisite details in your minds eye which was so pleasurable and joyous. It really made me reflect on my own consciousness and connection with the and belonging in the universe, so that was really inspiring and wonderful. The love poetry was also lovely. Definitely want to read more by the author and would recommend to friends.