Protection from Erasure

by Sami Miranda

In this poetry collection, Samuel Miranda aims to capture and celebrate a life lived and lives encountered. Through observations and conversations, we're reminded that mundane events and minute moments in our everyday lives can and should be memorialized. Part portraiture, part social commentary, and part memory, Protection from Erasure is meticulously crafted with arresting dialogue, sincere lines, and raw reflections that knit together and hover upon the edge of a shared remembrance.

Genres: Poetry

100 pages, Paperback

Published January 9, 2023

Reviews

[Kym Moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

Blood and emotion wells up throughout the verses in this poetry collection by Sami Miranda. His poetry is not the typical flowery essence of poems but rather a testament of connection reflecting real-life scenarios, a hive of highs and lows where oppression is a reality of behavioral suppression.

I allowed Sami's poems to ruminate through my consciousness, as I could relate to the emotional, psychological, and spiritual trauma of how the "haves and the power-holders" (that caste system) try to sweep the existence of people they feel who are beneath them under a societal rug. This is tragic, but not unusual because historically through the caste system, they refuse to connect to, accept, or understand a different, legitimate culture from their own. This attitude bleeds into how a culture adapts to, albeit they may not believe it, "their place" in the mania of societal prejudices and everyday reality.

Sami's personal thumbprint shapes many facets of life lessons, ancestral recollections, personal loss, and the everyday sounds and sights of people no one pays attention to or bothers to acknowledge their 'human' existence. Two of Sami's poems resonated with me on different levels, "ILL Legal" and the ethereal componentry of "Raga Lalit." There we so many takeaways that as I went through this book, I had to bookmark with tabs instead of dog earing them.



This is a highly recommended read to add to your poetry shelf.

[Burgi Zenhaeusern · Rating 5 out of 5]

Among the poems in Miranda's latest collection are ekphrases, compositions from phrases gleaned from Ntl. Geographics articles, and a series of self-portraits, among other poems most of which no longer than a page. What strikes me most with Miranda's poetry is how much work his few words and straightforward diction do, convincingly, poignantly, and winningly. No different in this collection, in which the poems are manifestos from the heart, unvarnished, not in search of perfection but generosity towards themselves and the community they invite the reader into.

[alexis · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lyrical invitation to reflect on memory, honor history, condemn neocolonial aspects of living, and consider life as a communal effort of being and revolution. Miranda gifts glimmers of personal reflections as well as the collective experience of many others. I absolutely adored this collection and I am hoping to find more of his works. Most importantly, I hope more people read this.

[Chloe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall the collection took a literal approach to encapsulating the environment around its pieces. The emotions were very accessible, but it was the poems that held something at arm's length away from me that gave me pause and stuck with me longer. My favorites of the collection were "Biblical Erotica", "Buscando un Arbol Que Me de Sombra", "The Waffle Shop", and then by far my personal favorite was "Keys and Coins"

Keys and Coins
....
A man passed by swinging his keys. When
he shoved them into his pocket, I thought
of the coins in mine. Nickels, quarters, dimes
that could not open my door, the seat of my pants
was wet and no one would be home for hours.