**This forthcoming title is only available for preorder at this time
“‘My body, a homeland,’ Laurel Nakanishi writes as a new mother in Late Morning Before the Abyss, opening a wondrous collection of lyrical poems that move gracefully between praise, prayer, elegy, ode, and lullaby, each a revelation declaring the world miraculous as it unfurls in firsts for her baby, who is ‘a stream / flowing always within and away from me.’ Every blessing, however, is tinged with grief: a ledger of what Hawaiʻi has survived, an insistence on what still lives, a fear of what threatens it yet—militarization, racism, pesticides, plastics, police violence, a warming ocean, extinction. She asks her son (and us with him): ‘Is it unfair to ask you to hope?’
These poems are as resplendent as the world they record, and just as delicate, just as resilient. They urge us to be responsible for the generations coming, to remember beauty together, to look again with new eyes and new love. Read them with everyone in your family, and name every everyday miracle. We need this baby's awe, this beautiful mothering. We need to know hope must now be taught and earned.”
— Brandy Nālani McDougall, Hawaiʻi Poet Laureate 2023-2025, author of ʻĀina Hānau, Birth Land
Late Morning Before the Abyss by Laurel Nakanishi dwells in the sleepless, heady days of caring for an infant amidst a swell of alarming current events: fires burn the Western US, a military fuel spill on Oʻahu contaminates drinking water, and climate research projects the worst is yet to come. And still, intimacy infuses the poems with urgency and love, sweetness and anxiety, giving voice to our human concerns and longings. Deeply rooted in the geography and cultural history of Hawaiʻi, these poems explore identity and place through creation and collapse. With vulnerability and lyricism, Late Morning Before the Abyss documents the emergence of a human life into this troubled world.
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Author Laurel Nakanishi was born and raised in Kapālama, O‘ahu, with ancestral roots that connect her to Japan and the European continent. She is a writer, educator, and author of the book of poetry, Ashore. Laurel has served communities in Hawaiʻi, Nicaragua, Montana, and Florida as a teaching artist, bringing poetry to public schools and community spaces. She holds degrees from the University of Montana and Florida International University, and has been fortunate to receive fellowships from the Fulbright Foundation and Japan-US Friendship Commission. Laurel is grateful for family dinners, kiddo jokes, mangoes, kukui groves, ocean, and the many amazing young people she meets in Hawai‘i public and charter schools.
_____
Softcover with french flaps | 104 pages | 6" x 9" | b&w
**This forthcoming title is only available for preorder at this time
“‘My body, a homeland,’ Laurel Nakanishi writes as a new mother in Late Morning Before the Abyss, opening a wondrous collection of lyrical poems that move gracefully between praise, prayer, elegy, ode, and lullaby, each a revelation declaring the world miraculous as it unfurls in firsts for her baby, who is ‘a stream / flowing always within and away from me.’ Every blessing, however, is tinged with grief: a ledger of what Hawaiʻi has survived, an insistence on what still lives, a fear of what threatens it yet—militarization, racism, pesticides, plastics, police violence, a warming ocean, extinction. She asks her son (and us with him): ‘Is it unfair to ask you to hope?’
These poems are as resplendent as the world they record, and just as delicate, just as resilient. They urge us to be responsible for the generations coming, to remember beauty together, to look again with new eyes and new love. Read them with everyone in your family, and name every everyday miracle. We need this baby's awe, this beautiful mothering. We need to know hope must now be taught and earned.”
— Brandy Nālani McDougall, Hawaiʻi Poet Laureate 2023-2025, author of ʻĀina Hānau, Birth Land
Late Morning Before the Abyss by Laurel Nakanishi dwells in the sleepless, heady days of caring for an infant amidst a swell of alarming current events: fires burn the Western US, a military fuel spill on Oʻahu contaminates drinking water, and climate research projects the worst is yet to come. And still, intimacy infuses the poems with urgency and love, sweetness and anxiety, giving voice to our human concerns and longings. Deeply rooted in the geography and cultural history of Hawaiʻi, these poems explore identity and place through creation and collapse. With vulnerability and lyricism, Late Morning Before the Abyss documents the emergence of a human life into this troubled world.
_____
Author Laurel Nakanishi was born and raised in Kapālama, O‘ahu, with ancestral roots that connect her to Japan and the European continent. She is a writer, educator, and author of the book of poetry, Ashore. Laurel has served communities in Hawaiʻi, Nicaragua, Montana, and Florida as a teaching artist, bringing poetry to public schools and community spaces. She holds degrees from the University of Montana and Florida International University, and has been fortunate to receive fellowships from the Fulbright Foundation and Japan-US Friendship Commission. Laurel is grateful for family dinners, kiddo jokes, mangoes, kukui groves, ocean, and the many amazing young people she meets in Hawai‘i public and charter schools.
_____
Softcover with french flaps | 104 pages | 6" x 9" | b&w