Girls’ Book of Knots by K. D. Harryman

With a sharp, tender eye for life’s beauty and brutality, K.D. Harryman’s “Girls’ Book of Knots,” is an instruction manual on how to survive the tightly knotted world of girlhood. Drawing from wisdom and warning, these poems thread together stories of childhood and motherhood with all of its charms, hurts, and triumphs. Set against the backdrop of rural Kentucky, where “hibiscus blooms, big as dinner plates” collide with pickup trucks and marshes thick with secrets, the girls who thrive are the ones who learn how to “make something,” of their worries, of their shame. The ones who know how to tie the truths of their lives together, so they can ultimately make a “foothold for climbing up, for climbing out,” of the quiet devastation of their past.

—Vandana Khanna

Poems such as “Useful Knots for Girls” make compassionate power out of powerlessness. These poems pull away from the grasp of patriarchy, the economic hardships of a small town, and a family who cannot see the knots they tie and the knots tied around their wrist. When one is born tied to the knot, the untying is difficult, but in these concisely crafted poems, Harryman brilliantly uses The Ashley Book of Knots to reimagine the knot as not the binding of one to their oppression and oppressors, “many grip the rope,” but “like a branch the blight had not yet reached, one that could still be cut away.”

— Tyree Daye

K. D. Harryman’s Girls’ Book of Knots is one of the most complete, compelling books I’ve read in a long time. She uses the central metaphor of knots in wildly creative and distinct ways to explore the complexity of her material. What holds it all together—indeed, propels this book forward—is the strong, powerful voice offering up sharp, vivid portraits of people and places that shape a life. She’s got some hard stories to tell, and she tells them with honesty, dignity, empathy, and nuance.

— Jim Daniels

K. D. Harryman grew up in western Kentucky. She is the recipient of the 2019 Rumi Prize sponsored by Arts & Letters and the 2018 James Hearst Poetry Prize sponsored by North American Review. Her first book, Auto Mechanic’s Daughter, was selected by Chris Abani for the Black Goat Poetry Series Imprint at Akashic Books in Brooklyn. She divides her time between Lake Beshear in Dawson Springs, Kentucky and Los Angeles where she studies social work at the University of Southern California and is Poetry Editor for Five South.

Book Information:

· Paperback: 98 pages

· Binding: Perfect-Bound

· Publisher: BlazeVOX [books] 

· ISBN: 978-1-60964-409-3

$18

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