Unapologetically Feminist

In her powerhouse collection, Unapologetically Feminist, poet Urvashi Bundel fights against the ravaging wildfires of misogyny, racism, and global social injustice with her own starbright flame. She travels the world in line after feverish line-observing, reporting back, and crying out for change. "The girl must eat / And the hyenas too. / In a fight to gather firewood, / She returns burned again from the bushes, / This time with the title of witch," the poet says. In so many of the places she goes, a woman of color with a strong, independent mind is too often vilified-her rights singed, her reputation covered in soot. Capitalism and imperialist wars only throw more fossil fuels onto this fire that blazes through one drought-blighted country after another: "How a nation gets auctioned / For sugar / And how tears become / Cheaper than onions." Sometimes you have no choice but to fight fire with fire. In Unapologetically Feminist, Bundel rises like a phoenix to prepare the way for the new green growth that unfurls from these smoldering embers, the smell of smoke blossoming in her hair.