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Reparations Now!
What is the price of a life, a stolen culture, a stolen heart? In formal and nontraditional poems, Reparations Now! asks for what is owed. Moving between voices and through intersecting histories, award-winning poet Ashley M. Jones offers perspectives both sharp and compassionate, exploring the difficulties of navigating our relationships with ourselves and others. From the murder of Mary Turner in 1918 to a case of infidelity to the oppressive nationalist movement of the present, Jones holds us accountable.
80 pages, Paperback
First published September 7, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
October 27, 2021
What phenomenal poetry. Each poem is beautifully crafted, deeply intelligent, and provocative. I devoured this collection and loved the ways these poems were in conversation with one another, with the world we live in, with pop culture, and with the poet’s life. A must read.
December 9, 2021
Ashley M. Jones officially became Alabama's Poet Laureate this week, the first black poet to do so in that state, and this collection from Hub City Writers is not to be missed.
One poem directly confronts past leadership in Alabama including a governor who promised segregation forever. Her poems demand that racial injustice be addressed (no surprise from the title) in specific ways, and she writes about her own experiences with being black and female and southern and still excluded or attacked or disenfranchised because of it.
One poem directly confronts past leadership in Alabama including a governor who promised segregation forever. Her poems demand that racial injustice be addressed (no surprise from the title) in specific ways, and she writes about her own experiences with being black and female and southern and still excluded or attacked or disenfranchised because of it.
June 28, 2021
In 2014, national correspondent for 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝘼𝙩𝙡𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙞𝙘 Ta-Nehisi Coates makes a case for reparations: “Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal. Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.” Fast-forward, seven years later, America still vacillates between moral ineptitude and transitional justice for Black people in this country. In Ashley M. Jones’ new poetry collection, 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐍𝐨𝐰!, she pens perfection when she trumpets to the nation—the debt is too big to repair, but the acknowledgment, the duty, and the justice owed to our people today are still necessary to right the wrongs of the past. Indisputably, you learn from this collection that “we” need “us” more than we need America. Jones reminds us: “The work is always the thing that makes us whole again.”
𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐍𝐨𝐰! is a collection that speaks to my girlhood, my southernness, my womanhood, and my blackness. I feel so visible and seen. There’s so many lines here that sting like a mosquito bite in the thickness of an Alabama summer and swells with memory and moments of pain, but then there’s my mama with a gentle touch and some soothing, calamine lotion to dry out that discomforting itch to recoup my joy. As a native Alabamian and black woman, I am connected and feel both love and grounding as I read each and every poem.
Jones makes you understand that the Black South has ALWAYS had something to say, but perhaps in the midst of chaos, hate, and division some of you are left unaccountable for your space in the “sweet land of white supremacy.” Jones is clearly here to reclaim our time, our respect, and our narratives so they have power and meaning.
Your bookshelves will be owed a lengthy explanation if you don’t pre-order this collection. 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐍𝐨𝐰! is out September 7, 2021.
𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐍𝐨𝐰! is a collection that speaks to my girlhood, my southernness, my womanhood, and my blackness. I feel so visible and seen. There’s so many lines here that sting like a mosquito bite in the thickness of an Alabama summer and swells with memory and moments of pain, but then there’s my mama with a gentle touch and some soothing, calamine lotion to dry out that discomforting itch to recoup my joy. As a native Alabamian and black woman, I am connected and feel both love and grounding as I read each and every poem.
Jones makes you understand that the Black South has ALWAYS had something to say, but perhaps in the midst of chaos, hate, and division some of you are left unaccountable for your space in the “sweet land of white supremacy.” Jones is clearly here to reclaim our time, our respect, and our narratives so they have power and meaning.
Your bookshelves will be owed a lengthy explanation if you don’t pre-order this collection. 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐍𝐨𝐰! is out September 7, 2021.
September 10, 2022
this was a random @henricolibrary grab i’m so glad i picked up — it’s a small but mighty collection of poems that provokes the reader to think deeper about race and reparations and the role we all play in reconciliation. these poems are written from various perspectives, each powerful and poignant, with a clear and compelling voice throughout calling us all to pay back what is owed and make right what was done so wrong.
June 7, 2022
Ashley Jones is Alabama’s Poet Laureate from 2022 - 2026. Her voice is strong and perceptive regarding racism, struggles, family, men, women, black children, and abuse. She grew up in a family watching meteor showers with backyards growing vegetables, fruits, and herbs. My favorites of the collection are “Stephon Don’t You Moan, Or, To Serve And Protect”, “Photosynthesis”, “She is Beauty, She is Grace”, “Poem In Which I Am Too Political To Read At Your School”, “A Case for Reparations”, and “I Find The Earring That Broke Loose From My Ear The Night A White Woman Told Me The World Would Always Save Her.”
November 6, 2021
Brilliant collection of poetry from the author’s life
October 27, 2021
I love the fearlessness, the forcefulness, and hope in these poems--passionate and unsparing testimonials. These poems take wing, and not to follow their flight is not an option. I hope they will be widely read and cited.
February 21, 2023
Some of these worked for me, some didn't. Overall the sharpness of the anger, the deepness of the sorrow, and the fierceness of the pride of the author came through loud and clear. The inclusion of some didn't seem to fit the overall tone, and the order was sometimes jarring when read back to back.
January 10, 2022
What a gorgeous book of poetry! I couldn't put it down.
March 28, 2023
"a catalog of things in which there is still god:
alabama in the summer/or winter/or autumn/or spring"
alabama in the summer/or winter/or autumn/or spring"
February 9, 2022
Stunning. Thought-provoking. Beautiful.
March 7, 2022
Excellent. Hard-hitting and full of hope and determination and beautifully laid out. Just beautiful all around.
September 7, 2023
A collection of poems about growing up Black, survival, racism, oppression, life, family, and love.
from Stephon Don't You Moan, Or, To Serve and Protect: "that night, / policeman, servant of the gun, did you give space // for a man's innocence to bloom? Despite / the loaded weight of your finger on the trigger, / despite how the night / painted the man bigger, / made him a giant with a fireball in his hands?"
from Words With Friends: "I learned that unrequited is an easy word to / chew - it falls right off the bone, tender barbeque."
from Sonnet with Kanye West and Late Uncle: "Back then, all I wanted was to be cool enough to know the lyrics - / not the chorus, but the obscure ones. It was simple, / then, the way we swore July would never end. Too young to fear it, / we let death, or worse, time, creep up behind us - / the song bounced on and hid the darker notes: tragedy, loss."
from Stephon Don't You Moan, Or, To Serve and Protect: "that night, / policeman, servant of the gun, did you give space // for a man's innocence to bloom? Despite / the loaded weight of your finger on the trigger, / despite how the night / painted the man bigger, / made him a giant with a fireball in his hands?"
from Words With Friends: "I learned that unrequited is an easy word to / chew - it falls right off the bone, tender barbeque."
from Sonnet with Kanye West and Late Uncle: "Back then, all I wanted was to be cool enough to know the lyrics - / not the chorus, but the obscure ones. It was simple, / then, the way we swore July would never end. Too young to fear it, / we let death, or worse, time, creep up behind us - / the song bounced on and hid the darker notes: tragedy, loss."
September 7, 2021
Reparations Now! is the most powerful poetry collection I've read this year. Ashley M. Jones' poetry is brutally, necessarily honest. That exclamation point in the title is there for a reason. If you read just one book of poems this year, choose Reparations Now!
I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Edelweiss; the opinions are my own.
I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Edelweiss; the opinions are my own.
October 9, 2021
This poetry offers up the most beautiful, most heartbreaking, and all around insight of Ashley’s life and how she has processed her experiences.
Much of her poems allowed me to find a place of solidarity which is always hard to find.
Much of her poems allowed me to find a place of solidarity which is always hard to find.
April 20, 2022
it turns out, all along hell was earth
is there a police protocol for grace
the spitshine of his teeth
my skin and my love are inseparable
I’ve been thinking about getting older, the way it seems like some /
years pass quick as a a snap, my life between two fingers.
the camera’s numb /
eye can’t capture memory, just pixels and pigments
we will see something impossible, and impossibly generous
I am all sky, mouth open like this whole world is a big bright drink
the way my sister’s eyes hold the starglow
this beauty is built on work
When you call waste, /
I call power.
except the rose was black and you killed it, black and you silenced it, black and it could not vote
Black oppression’s not happenstance; it’s law.
his heart, a fortress of muscle and money
Two boys, pink in their manhood
a brown man, skin tired of holding his bones
She is not kind. /
All of this is private, she says.
the sky darkens, & I remember the color of my skin
What a sin, /
it seems, to think my comfort is not temporary.
one black person’s fear :: siren
I have more than the right to die.
anything masters deemed dangerous: education, revolt, joy, or religious worship
God made sweet potato pie and aunties and mamas who know how to add just enough nutmeg.
fear and the way it slices us up thin and flimsy
nobody asked / to watch you eat / with your whole fat tongue
the trick of pleasure masquerading as love
I know I wasn’t loved by you / you ain’t gotta tell me / I know the shape of unlove
What does it mean to see my own body and think, now you’re finished. Now you’re real.
I had to impress his parents. I had to fit in the palm of his hand.
wish to God and to the editors of Cosmopolitan — just let me be pretty
did you let my body’s gift curdle in your crude retelling?
Bestiary of Bad Kisses
this would be the last time I let a boy kiss me, /
knowing I did not want him.
no revolution necessary, /
no brave needed, just loving me
I said, why are you doing this to me? What I meant: why did I do this to myself?
God blew my eyes open, as if shooing dust off the table
where coming back is beautiful and not regressive, where coming back means a natural return and not a backpedal
An mhm is softer, sweeter than yes— /
out of my mother’s mouth
the most glittering hint of mischief in her dimple
That’s the least I’m owed — a face, skin, hair so obviously, inherently, objectively beautiful it’s frozen in plastic and sold to kids all over America to hug and love and look at with the eyes of dreams.
[I find the earring that broke loose from my ear the night a white woman told me the world would always save her]
I’m always asked to consider how good a person is, what they meant versus what they said.
My country tis of thee, sweet land of white supremacy.
as American as the day is long and still called wrong
The work is always the thing that makes us whole again.
My grandmothers made America
I know when I leave /
this broken earth I’ll find them there, sweetening every hour.
These men who call themselves /
bootstrapping and self-made, somewhere there’s a Black woman and /
her unthanked hands who lifted them to where they are now.
Surely, heaven is a place where men can’t make anyplace /
a dangerous corner—
surely, there, a smile is a smile and not a taunt.
searching for sugar /
instead of skin
you’ll be surprised, my darling, at how well each hurt can fit
is there a police protocol for grace
the spitshine of his teeth
my skin and my love are inseparable
I’ve been thinking about getting older, the way it seems like some /
years pass quick as a a snap, my life between two fingers.
the camera’s numb /
eye can’t capture memory, just pixels and pigments
we will see something impossible, and impossibly generous
I am all sky, mouth open like this whole world is a big bright drink
the way my sister’s eyes hold the starglow
this beauty is built on work
When you call waste, /
I call power.
except the rose was black and you killed it, black and you silenced it, black and it could not vote
Black oppression’s not happenstance; it’s law.
his heart, a fortress of muscle and money
Two boys, pink in their manhood
a brown man, skin tired of holding his bones
She is not kind. /
All of this is private, she says.
the sky darkens, & I remember the color of my skin
What a sin, /
it seems, to think my comfort is not temporary.
one black person’s fear :: siren
I have more than the right to die.
anything masters deemed dangerous: education, revolt, joy, or religious worship
God made sweet potato pie and aunties and mamas who know how to add just enough nutmeg.
fear and the way it slices us up thin and flimsy
nobody asked / to watch you eat / with your whole fat tongue
the trick of pleasure masquerading as love
I know I wasn’t loved by you / you ain’t gotta tell me / I know the shape of unlove
What does it mean to see my own body and think, now you’re finished. Now you’re real.
I had to impress his parents. I had to fit in the palm of his hand.
wish to God and to the editors of Cosmopolitan — just let me be pretty
did you let my body’s gift curdle in your crude retelling?
Bestiary of Bad Kisses
this would be the last time I let a boy kiss me, /
knowing I did not want him.
no revolution necessary, /
no brave needed, just loving me
I said, why are you doing this to me? What I meant: why did I do this to myself?
God blew my eyes open, as if shooing dust off the table
where coming back is beautiful and not regressive, where coming back means a natural return and not a backpedal
An mhm is softer, sweeter than yes— /
out of my mother’s mouth
the most glittering hint of mischief in her dimple
That’s the least I’m owed — a face, skin, hair so obviously, inherently, objectively beautiful it’s frozen in plastic and sold to kids all over America to hug and love and look at with the eyes of dreams.
[I find the earring that broke loose from my ear the night a white woman told me the world would always save her]
I’m always asked to consider how good a person is, what they meant versus what they said.
My country tis of thee, sweet land of white supremacy.
as American as the day is long and still called wrong
The work is always the thing that makes us whole again.
My grandmothers made America
I know when I leave /
this broken earth I’ll find them there, sweetening every hour.
These men who call themselves /
bootstrapping and self-made, somewhere there’s a Black woman and /
her unthanked hands who lifted them to where they are now.
Surely, heaven is a place where men can’t make anyplace /
a dangerous corner—
surely, there, a smile is a smile and not a taunt.
searching for sugar /
instead of skin
you’ll be surprised, my darling, at how well each hurt can fit
August 5, 2021
Reparations Now! See that exclamation in the title and feel it’s power be cautious Ashley M. Jones is here for accountability, to tell the truth about history and to honor the Black ancestors whose lives were stolen making this country. A mix of poems about historical records, family experiences and cultural observations, Jones uses precise, bold language throughout to draw in and hold the reader.
In “Photosynthesis” she writes about her family’s connection to land and farming: “this is the work we have always known/ pulling food and flowers from a pile of earth./ The difference, now: my father is not a slave,/ not a sharecropper. This land is his and so is this garden,/ so is this work. The difference is that he owns this labor.”
This sense of legacy, this assertion of belonging to one’s own self first rings through this collection and provides one of the most important additions to the larger literary discourse about reparations. Generations of class inequity means we continue to see deep disparities of wealth. Disparities of mental health and trauma. Disparities of the unending chains of capitalism, of debt, of targeted oppression through the criminal justice system.
In “Friendly Skies, Or, Black Woman Speaks Herself Into God,” Jones reimagines a Black flight attendant as God, as ushering them through the miracle of flight, as having the ability to grasp “the big dark bag we call manifest destiny” in her hands. And she is—as Jones remembers the depths of care Black women have always shown, the cradling of this country in their hands with no reward. What else but a god?
In “Photosynthesis” she writes about her family’s connection to land and farming: “this is the work we have always known/ pulling food and flowers from a pile of earth./ The difference, now: my father is not a slave,/ not a sharecropper. This land is his and so is this garden,/ so is this work. The difference is that he owns this labor.”
This sense of legacy, this assertion of belonging to one’s own self first rings through this collection and provides one of the most important additions to the larger literary discourse about reparations. Generations of class inequity means we continue to see deep disparities of wealth. Disparities of mental health and trauma. Disparities of the unending chains of capitalism, of debt, of targeted oppression through the criminal justice system.
In “Friendly Skies, Or, Black Woman Speaks Herself Into God,” Jones reimagines a Black flight attendant as God, as ushering them through the miracle of flight, as having the ability to grasp “the big dark bag we call manifest destiny” in her hands. And she is—as Jones remembers the depths of care Black women have always shown, the cradling of this country in their hands with no reward. What else but a god?
February 8, 2022
“The business of poetry is so thick with privilege, so smothered in the rust of its old gates—how can you breathe among all that rot?” —Ashley Jones, “I Find the Earring That Broke Loose from My Ear the Night a White Woman Told Me the World Would Always Save Her”. And yet the poet manages to find her voice to speak stridently against a host of issues and softly for the love of family, especially in her masterpiece, “Photosynthesis.”
Favorite Poems:
“Mary, Don’t You Weep, Or, Mary Turner Resurrection”
“Home Security”
“Meteor Shower”
“Photosynthesis”
“Manifest Destiny”
“Love in the Time of Pandemic”
“A Poem About the Body”
“Words with Friends”
“An Experiential and Intellectual Discourse on the N-Word”
“Oil Change”
“How to Let Go, Or, I Smudged Lost Loved Away into the Ocean”
Favorite Poems:
“Mary, Don’t You Weep, Or, Mary Turner Resurrection”
“Home Security”
“Meteor Shower”
“Photosynthesis”
“Manifest Destiny”
“Love in the Time of Pandemic”
“A Poem About the Body”
“Words with Friends”
“An Experiential and Intellectual Discourse on the N-Word”
“Oil Change”
“How to Let Go, Or, I Smudged Lost Loved Away into the Ocean”
April 21, 2025
jones's poems are unashamedly honest, an open wound of grief and healing that demands the reader not look away. incredible collection ruminating, whispering, and screaming all at once on race, god, love, and life. it's cohesive, well paced, and peppered with unique poem formats, none of which felt gimmicky for the sake of having done something new—it all felt purposeful. just an extremely poignant and enjoyable read.
June 8, 2025
Really poignant poems, though some of them were more...literary (idk the right word...AP Lit poetry-y??) than I generally like to read.
***quotes***
"money said separate but equal
money said 3/5ths a man
money said four score and seven years ago" (49)
"Surely, heaven is a place where men can't make anyplace
a dangerous corner--
surely, there, a smile is a smile and not a taunt." (63)
***quotes***
"money said separate but equal
money said 3/5ths a man
money said four score and seven years ago" (49)
"Surely, heaven is a place where men can't make anyplace
a dangerous corner--
surely, there, a smile is a smile and not a taunt." (63)
November 7, 2021
Bold, provocative, and fearless poems, written in an impressive variety of forms but always in a distinctive voice, bear witness to the lives of generations of Alabama's Black women. Ashley M. Jones's directness reminds me of Lucille Clifton: she can celebrate life and condemn injustice with equal passion, and she never wastes a word. Highly recommended.
January 10, 2022
Always a pleasure to spend time with Ashley M. Jones's smart, inventive poems. I feel like this book is in conversation with her last book, dark // thing, covering similar issues of race, gender, and the joys and challenges they inform. So if you loved dark // thing, get your hands on this lovely collection!
March 1, 2022
I'm not a poetry reader. I read this for my Read Harder Challenge. I'm glad I did. This collection spoke to me, most likely because I'm a AA woman and the themes are real life. Reading outside my comfort zone in 2022 is my goal and while I can't say I'll just be reading poetry from now on, this collection has opened me to seek out more of readings I feel in my soul.
December 29, 2022
Beautiful poetry written by a wonderful person. I had the opportunity to meet Ashley Jones and listen to her read some poems from Reparations Now! And it was a phenomenal experience.
Her work manages to be both raw and full of grace, captivating the reader with delicately laced emotion and honesty.
I highly recommend this book.
Her work manages to be both raw and full of grace, captivating the reader with delicately laced emotion and honesty.
I highly recommend this book.
October 28, 2021
Honest, direct poetry that bursts from the page and speaks out loud with a distinctive voice that demands to be heard. This is truly great writing - truly great art - that intimately illuminates a particular lived experience while cutting to the core of what America is.
March 5, 2022
It has taken me a lifetime to really start to appreciate poetry and I am thrilled to now have easy access to work like this that finally makes me appreciate the form. Deeply emotional, raw, beautiful, soaring, and direct…all the things. Recommended.
July 27, 2021
Brilliant.
December 7, 2021
Tender and full of fire—some of the most beautiful parental love poems, poems for Alabama, poems for reparations, poems that call readers to love and justice. Highly recommend!
December 20, 2021
Gorgeous, painful, but also uplifting poems.
February 6, 2022
A wonderful, short book of poems. Jones' mastery of language paints vivid pictures that touch deep wells of emotion, joy, anger, love, loss and pain.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews