Mothering Tongue by Cynthia Nwakudu

Mothering Tongue by Cynthia Nwakudu weaves themes of intergenerational trauma, memory, deep histories, and intersections of gender, race, and class into poems that are at once as formally rigorous and experimental as they are deeply personal. Drawing on the influences Black Motherhood and her cultural background growing up in Nigeria without her birth mother, the poet explores the presences and absences of mother figures throughout her community and challenges the relentless cycles of suffering, injury, and loss that affix trauma to the very grammar of a community. Mixing English and Yoruba, Nwakudu deftly deploys language as a poetic wayfarer navigating the “jungle of cultures and crossings” we all must traverse to feel whole—and wholly cared for.