Time’s Language

Overview

Time's Language contains powerful poems of witness as well as personal poems, and autobiographical prose pieces (that read like prose poems), recounting a life of resistance, the life of a life-long literary and political revolutionary. As US Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera writes, "Here are Margaret Randall's decades of love, ink, tears, contestation and light—let us bow in gratitude for this truth-telling, daring, border-breaking, pioneering long-time volume of soul fire."

Reviews

"Margaret Randall's name rolls off the tongue as our champion citizen of the imagination. The United States government deported her for her brilliant, outlaw poems. This beautiful book contains sixty extraordinary years of verse! Every library worthy of its readers and of protecting the canon of courageous, resilient poets needs this book!" —C. A. Conrad, author of ECODEVIANCE: (Soma)tics for the Future Wilderness  

"Margaret Randall's work is a gift of charmed vision. Language-Magic in conference with the kicks of social/personal realism. She sings of the pan-experience of human consciousness, profoundly female, resonant and elegant in her essence-statement, 'Everyone is born a poet.' All in dignity to the marginalized spirit-lives of the misbegotten where the poet-activist shares love and anger, education and intellect, protest and mercy—and everyone's right to rise above their station." —Thurston Moore, author of No Wave: Post-Punk. Underground. New York. 1976-1980.  

 "It is an honor to read this collection of poems, that at times appears as a revolutionary's journal, a lover's secret notes, a mother's many lives and a seer's grasp of that which cannot be named—this life of incredible being in battle against non-being. We are given many clues on the road to the 'homeland,' which we all seek. It is made of 'pieces,' 'wicked stints,' darknesses and liberations, gifts, searches, that is, an ever-expanding consciousness, examination and explosion into and out of our body as we leap toward the heart of the people. Here are Margaret Randall's decades of love, ink, tears, contestation and light—let us bow in gratitude for this truth-telling, daring, border-breaking, pioneering long-time volume of soul fire." —Juan Felipe Herrera Poet Laureate of the United States 2015-2017  

"Margaret Randall, poet, translator, activist, is our conscience, a force of nature, a national treasure who has never faltered in her poetic or humanitarian imagination. She embodies the call of poetry to help wake the world up to itself. Her many worlds in poetry selected here are by turns tender, passionate, fierce, and her gleanings from an extraordinary life are more instructive than ever. Time's Language is a salve for these dystopic times, a generous antidote for the turmoil. Every letter counts." —Anne Waldman, author of The Iovis Trilogy: Colors in the Mechanism of Concealment, Chancellor of The Academy of American Poets  

"Margaret Randall is a formidable woman and an inspiration. Her words contain ages of experience and beauty and wisdom. She's of the Earth and a warrior for the future. Hear her poetry and know why birds sing and humanity will fulfill its promises." —Gioconda Belli, author of Infinity in the Palm of Her Hand  

Author Biography

Katherine M. Hedeen is the Poetry Translation Editor for the Kenyon Review and is a Professor of Spanish at Kenyon College. Víctor Rodríguez Núñez (Havana, 1955) is a poet, journalist, literary critic, translator, and scholar. He has compiled three anthologies of 20th century Cuban poetry, La poesía del siglo XX en Cuba (2011). He is Professor of Spanish at Kenyon College. Margaret Randall is a feminist poet, writer, photographer and social activist. She is the author of over 100 books. In 1990, Randall was awarded the Lillian Hellman and Dashiell Hammett grant for writers victimized by political repression.