Don’t miss Kaveh Akbar’s review of Olio, by Tyehimba Jess (Wave Books), for Oxford American:
The characters cast in Olio’s poly-vocal swirl count no fewer than a dozen, and almost all of them are famous (or infamous) figures of the early blues or ragtime canon.
Reclamation is expressed through appropriation, echo, and poems that are often hybrid, brilliant, and brand-new.