body of water by Chestina Craig. 36-page, perfect bound chapbook of poetry and photography. Available through Sadie Girl Press Bookstore.

“When you are a girl, you are born with a heavy that manifests in your arms and legs, in the hole in your stomach, and in the swells of your tongue. Craig gives a name to these manifestations. All these poems were born in the ocean or were born in her heart; sometimes I think both of these are the same. She counts the heavy, knows it, faces it, loves it in all the forms in comes into a woman’s body and somehow gives them words.” ~Farah Billah, author of Wrong Turns Lead Here

“In her poems, Chestina guides the reader through personal narrative with a sharp imagination that both shocks & surprises at every turn. I find myself discovering something new on every page—about the natural world, about love on one’s own terms, & about the celebration of self. Her poems are vulnerable & massive at the same time as she unpacks what it means to live & stay alive. She is unafraid to affirm her own right to take up space & she does so with a “knife-in-boot confidence” that is entirely her own.” ~Brandon Melendez, Berkeley Grand Slam Champion

“Chestina is a nuanced voice in the burgeoning poetry renaissance in Long Beach, California. Her work serves as a backdrop of landscapes natural and cerebral with the most intrinsic f-words laced intentionally throughout. She’s dope, read her words.” ~Antonio Cortez Appling, founder of The Long Beach Poetry Slam