Linzey Corridon’s debut poetry collection West of West Indian is a unique and insightful exploration of queer Caribbean life. The author explores his queer, mixed race identity alongside poems about home and diaspora, and the themes of grief, legacy, and belonging are at the heart of this book. 

There are a lot things we don’t talk about in West Indian culture, and queerness is one of them. It’s rarely accepted or celebrated, and it carries a lot of shame. West of West Indian exposes this shame and addresses some of the harm within our culture. This feels so radical and necessary. With every page, Corridon embraces his history and identity to address and break the cycles of trauma that exist within West Indian culture. The poet shares his sorrow and grief about the struggles of queer Caribbeans, but assures readers that these cycles can and will be broken. This book is an act of defiance and offers a path forward, one of healing and acceptance. 

There is power in remembering where we’ve come from and those who came before us, and this book seeks to remember in order to reclaim queerness and fight back against the erasure of queer identities in the Caribbean. The beauty of this collection is that Corridon is simply sharing his daily life and personal experiences in an effort to normalize queer Caribbean life. By openly sharing his queerness, he paves the way for others to do the same. In poems that feel almost like prayers, Corridon seeks to affirm queer Caribbean life in the past, present, and future. His poems honour the queer ancestors that came before him, and they also reach out to the ancestors for connection and kinship. In West of West Indian, Corridon crafts a new legacy of compassion and care, and makes space for all queer Caribbeans to feel like they belong. 

Thank you Mawenzi House for the gifted copy!