Sweetwater Mass

A powerful and innovative debut collection—the first in the new Polaris Poetry Series—that captures the rhythms of Black girlhood as it navigates the spaces between city and southern roots.

Through poems rooted in Hoodoo spirituality and the author’s Gullah Geechee heritage, Shakeema Smalls’s Sweetwater Mass uncovers ways of knowing that transcend physical and temporal barriers, boldly addressing the lived realities of racism, classism, and economic struggle while simultaneously journeying ...