Watching Myself Die

Watching Myself Die by Tekeyah Hall is a debut collection unlike any other. Through an exciting blend of poetry and prose, this slim volume introduces us to TK, "born from a spark," allowing us to move from within her unique thoughts and through the world around her. Hall paints stunning pictures, and we begin to understand our own fragility, as though we are "made of cellophane . . . a glass statue." Watching Myself Die offers us a wild world where magic meets the military and souls take celestial journeys after betrayal. Hall's stories and poems build their fires with small sparks, revealing a narrator wrestling with dark emotions through the self-destructive turns those emotions can lead us to, conjuring up "the little sliver of doubt that clouds all judgement . . . the wrecker of your happily ever after." Readers understand the effects that our own deepest hurts have had on us when we see "[p]illowy wool turned to fur, round short teeth [turning] canine, and [she begins] to devour those who stood in [her] way." Hall then throws us for a wonderfully psychological loop when we meet Rogue in "Birth of the Warrior," and nothing is as it seems. Watching Myself Die does not simply color outside the lines. This multi-genre hybrid collection leaps beautifully up the walls, taking readers on a surprising journey they won't soon forget. As "the moon pulls the ocean," we are drawn into Hall's story.