STORIES AND POEMS INSPIRED BY MUSIC - A young woman disentangles herself from a cult leader. A man watches a crowd carry a baby into the woods. A boy encounters a childhood friend who turns out to be a different kind of creature than what he believes. The forty pieces in this book combine two activities at the heart of what it means to be human: making music and telling stories. Each writer took inspiration from one of the ten tracks on the Wayward & Upward album by Spinoza Gambit. This anthology collects one short story and three poems for each track, showcasing the variety of interpretations a single piece of music can evoke.

A life that crisscrosses Zimbabwe, England, and Canada. A self-imposed exile, a state of constant waiting. Jennifer Mariani’s poems grieve a life she can’t return to, even as she struggles to belong elsewhere. Never far from the page is the reality of growing up white in post-independence Zimbabwe: Jennifer’s own privilege juxtaposed with everyday poverty and racism. The poems in this book cry out with grief and rage and loss, and sometimes celebration. Every page is warm with the heat of Africa and wet with the tears of unbelonging.

Whether seeking asylum, travelling between homes, or studying abroad, these poems shimmer and roar with the chaos, beauty and astonishment that come with crossing borders. The impetus for crossing varies, but whatever the reason, borders loom large in the lives of these poets.

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