A stark, visceral collection of free verse and prose poetry, Skin
Memory scours a wild landscape haunted by personal tragedy and the
cruel consequences of human acts in search of tenderness and
regeneration. In this book of daring and introspection, John Sibley
Williams considers the capriciousness of youth, the terrifying loss
of cultural identity and self-identity, and what it means to live
in an imperfect world. He reveals each body as made up of all
bodies, histories, and shared dreams of the future. In these poems
absence can be held, the body's dust is just dust, and though
childhood is but a poorly edited memory and even our
well-intentioned gestures tend toward ruin, Williams nonetheless
says, "I'm pretty sure, everything within us says something
beautiful."