Heavy Daughter Blues: Poems and Stories, 1968-1986

Poet Wanda Coleman provides a how-to manual, revealing some immediate ways not only to "fix a bad man hex" or "do dirty better," but to keep one's dream-light burning amid the aching rush of dark and anxious times.

These poems and stories reflect the daily struggles of a poet-performer whose fight to survive is "plagued by the fear of not making it" ("Trying To Get In").
Poverty is an ever-present set of "claws" to grapple with, and in Coleman's realistically-apprehended present there's no way to beat the Man at his own game:

it's high noon
the sheriff is an IBM executive / it shoots 120 words per secretary
i reach for the white-out
it's too fast for me
i'm blown to blazes ("Job Hunter").
Passion and desire yield insights, also betrayals:
yes i do think of you
when i'm with him
even laugh out loud
remembering our summer's fun
how it might be fun again
still, something in his eyes
i do not see in yours ("Four Men").