Faun

by Brandi George

The book flinches like a school of fish, a murmuration, a murder nation, my colonizer’s baby handprint on a paneled wall in a farmhouse in Ovid, Michigan. The book unearths burial mounds and flattens them into fields. My ancestors removed the bones, and I removed arrowheads from the creek, and I held them to my heart, and I searched the grass for blood, but all I saw was a starling. She hid her eggs in my chest, and when I drifted to sleep I saw black-winged, nameless shadows.

This is the Book of Lily.

In Faun, Brandi George explores the sudden erasure of human and nonhuman populations from her hometown of Ovid, Michigan. Embodying various voices, forms, and media, a young girl named Lily undergoes a series of transformations guided by forest crones, flora, and fauna. A reworking of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Faun also reflects on the themes of sexual violence that often occur in the mythic.

Genres: Poetry

170 pages, Paperback

Published October 29, 2019

Reviews

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ms. George flames when she combines her poetry with narrative! And Faun does exactly that. A huge bonus comes with a tour de force poem entitled “Darkness” near the end. Enjoy the sounds; enjoy the emotion!