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by Danika Paige Myers (Author)
How do we remember the dead in a world filled with the ephemeral? In her debut poetry collection, Her Names, Her Wits, Danika Paige Myers explores the "backwards magic" of memory. Inspired by her young daughter's curiosity about death, Myers transforms mourning and memory into mending, stitching together domestic life with the rituals of the cemetery. Spanning from the windswept Oregon coast to the industrial ruins of Oella Mill near Baltimore, Maryland, these poems fit together like a handmade quilt. Myers pieces together found names and historical research, turning forgotten headstones into rhythmic chants. Family stories are retold in new lyric forms while the muse, Clotho, presides over the scene, spinning out threads of life and language. Beyond personal memory and loss, the collection confronts the environmental legacy of the 21st century. Myers examines the cemetery not just as a place of rest, but as a contested urban green space-a sanctuary for cicadas, deer, and geese that defies modern development and plastic waste.
Why read Her Names, Her Wits? For fans of contemporary poetry, the collection offers a fresh voice exploring motherhood, ancestry, and reflection on what cemeteries represent in our modern landscape. Her Names, Her Wits is a profound exploration of what grows from the bones of the past and how we hold the names that define us.
