Goodnight, Chandrama, 2024

"Goodnight, Chandrama is a collection of poetry that aims to weave the tale of a Trinidadian-American poet who constantly finds himself in a nebulous space between two cultures. At first, it explores what life is like through the eyes of teenagedom and young adulthood; a sense of "is this all that I am?" The poems work through thoughts of suicide, of loneliness, one of Caribbean mythology, and of innocence, long lost. They aim to capture and question the lives that surround the poet as well, though some pieces focus on the interiority, the fear that the poet has for himself. The poetry behaves in a sinusoidal motion: Moving from grief, to longing, to anger, and back again. It is wrapped by the C.S. Lewis quote, "I sat with my anger long enough, until she told me her name was grief." and the concept of samsara, found in repetition." -- Abstract