"Tomorrow Someone Will Arrest You" by Meena Kandasamy is a powerful response to her critics, the government, and the world at large. Her use of Tamil and its lyrical beauty in her poems is brilliant. Kandasamy employs mythology as an analogy to address contemporary issues. these poems talk about a lot including religion, casteism, decoloniality, religious politics, language, climate, relationships, family, grief, and love. The poems are imbued with righteous indignation and profound love, making them both deeply personal and universally relevant.

Meena Kandasamy's imagery, wit, and subtle philosophy shine through in this collection. Her attempt to integrate elements of Tamil adds a unique layer of authenticity and depth.

4.5/5

Thank you to NetGalley and Atlantic Books for this book in lieu of an honest review.

Living in the world that we do, it's often hard to look at one's prospects and still have hope, Yet, the poems in this collection manage to carry that hope through their words.

Meena Kandasamy's writing is unflinching, and in this book she takes on her critics and opponents with a steely gaze.

The book itself explores politics, identity and structures of power, and she is blazing in how she approaches them.

A particular highlight for me was when Kandasamy directly talks back to those who have opposed her and her work, particularly through lenses of caste, race and gender.

For example, knowing that her words have been twisted and misappropriated, almost entirely in bad faith, she argues back that the thing scaring her opponents most is that she dared to say them, and dared to say them as a woman. Her character is dragged through the mud, and she fires back with just as much power, if not more.

I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I love the ideas and sentiments expressed through this collection but didn't always appreciate it as poetry - sometimes the rhythm slips and so rather than verse, it just reads as a
sentence
broken up onto
separate lines.

That said, I like the reach of the collection, from tender, private moments to political resistance. And the way the first is intertwined with the latter - how watching a baby sleep recalls a drowned refugee child washed up, for instance.

Helpful notes on sources and intertexts.