The Black, The White, and The Grey

Are you proud of where you come from,

Are you proud of what you've done?

Do you linger alone, living in your past,

Or are you proud of how far you've come?

("Proud," p. 123)

For some of us, life is not easy, right from the jump. What seems so natural and easy to others can become hard-hard as ice, stifling as quicksand-when our own minds seem to plague us. Perhaps it's because of something we haven't been able to process-some trauma, heartbreak, grief. Or perhaps life has never been easy to metabolize-dealing with the pain we inevitably must face.

Striking, forceful, and animated by intense feeling, The Black, the White, and the Grey is a tripartite poetic journey through mental illness-from the black of depression to the white of manic euphoria, through the grey numbness that lies between. The poems speak to difficult feelings many of us encounter, but which are rarely given voice, from the despair of addiction to the suffocating pain of a loved one's death.

For those of us who do identify with mental illness, we may see ourselves especially reflected in first-time author Taylor's dauntlessly honest poems, which speak to the darkest corners of human experience-heartbreak, grief, substance abuse, self-harm, addiction, suicide-as well as the love and faith that can (sometimes) manage to carry us through. Ultimately, though, no matter the weight we must bear, as the book's final section, the white, affirms, there is hope and healing at the end of the tunnel we travel.