WHAT GOD IN THE KINGDOM OF BASTARDS, poems

96pp., paperback, University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, 2025

ISBN: 9780822967576

A poetic exploration of the ways trauma - both personal and systemic - permeates family, faith, and identity.

"'I was made in Kumasi, Ghana,' writes the poet. And indeed, Ghana is a durable touchstone in the metamorphic landscapes of these remarkable poems, where we are as likely to encounter a snowstorm in Manhattan or a garden in New Mexico as a barbershop in Accra, where a Pentecostal baptism and the memory of a childhood beating can structure generations of familial narrative. Gyamfi is a poet of rare mythic abundance; his imagination seems to have no limits." Linda Gregerson, author of Canopy

"These are poems possessed by influence - the shades of elders, both familial and literary, the spirits of language and history and home - but from these ghostly voices, Gyamfi has forged an oracular style all his own: searching, restless, and utterly radiant. What God in the Kingdom of Bastards is a stunning, searing debut." Peter Ho Davies, author of A Lie Someone Told You About Yourself

Brian Gyamfi is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize, a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship, the Zell Fellowship, and two Hopwood Awards. His libretto The Ants Are Illuminated was commissioned by Overtone Industries for their Original Vision opera. His writing has appeared in Poetry, Narrative, Guernica, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere. He serves as a contributing editor at Oxford Poetry, and lives in Washington, DC.