queer poetry books nat read this year and loved

looking for reading recs? look no further!

As everyone reflects on the past year with “best of” lists, I thought it might be nice to share some 2023 releases that I read and enjoyed.

• Freedom House by KB Brookins (Deep Vellum). This is one of those books that will stay with me for a long time. There’s so much to love about Brookins’ poetry, and I think this book is an essential read.

• Spellbook for the Sabbath Queen by Elisheva Fox (Belle Point Press). Fox has a gift for melding a delicate sort of beauty with words that absolutely cut to the core. There’s something so visceral about the longing in this book.

• Explodingly Yours by Chen Chen (Ghost City Press). Unapologetically queer and at once a heartbreak and a triumph, Chen’s recent chapbook brought me through a full spectrum of emotions.

• Book of Extraction: Poems with Teeth by Adrian Dallas Frandle (kith books). Talk about visceral. I have my own complicated relationship with teeth, and each of Frandle’s poems felt even more satisfying than the last as they stacked on top of each other in my mind.

• Love Letters from a Burning Planet by MJ Gomez (Variant Lit). Poignant and deliberate at every turn, Gomez circles the body in an act of poetic ceremony, executed with heart-rending care (from my blurb of this chapbook, which was an honor to write).

• Mutable Forests by Noah David Roberts (kith books). Continuing on the theme of something visceral, Roberts has a knack for communicating the precise location where the body meets the mind. Consequently, these poems are as much a confession as they are a celebration of the organic.

• flower tongues by dre levant (Ghost City Press). levant’s playful arrangements on the page meet the erotic in this short but oh-so-sweet micro.

• Computer Baby by Lindsay Hargrave (Bottlecap Press). Experimental as ever, Hargrave is also lowkey always hilarious in their exploration of the ways we have become one with machines.

And a few honorable mentions that didn’t come out in 2023, but that I read and loved…

• Don’t Call Us Dead by Danez Smith (Graywolf Press)

• A Prayer For A Non-Religious Autistic by Lucas Scheelk (Mason Jar Press)

• Almanac of Useless Talents by Michael Chang (Clash Books)

• The Renunciations by Donika Kelly (Graywolf Press)

• Thrown in the Throat by Benjamin Garcia (Milkweed Editions)

We also asked the community on Twitter (I will never call it X, sorry) what their favorite queer reads of 2023 were, and got some great answers that we recommend you check out!

This time, actually until 2024,
nat raum, editor-in-chief