Finna

August 1, 2020
Finna, a contraction of fixing to that salts the Black vernacular from that of southern grandmas to hip-hop artists, is the perfect title for multiple-award-winning Marshall's second collection, following Wild Hundreds (2015). Marshall explores fixity of language, identity, place, and intent?what happened and what was finna happen. The dichotomy is laid out in a masterful poem about art and artifacts, everyday i act permanent. Several poems address language and its power to (dis)empower, including slave grammar, which delineates the accumulation of influences on language from neighborhoods to magnet schools to slurs, concluding we make shambles of their standards / we stand on them / & fashion an abolition / in diction. While Marshall exposes the power and cost of language, one of Finna's great pleasures is the sensuality of his lines even as his meaning rubs raw. scruples is almost onomatopoetic in its adoration of the title word: i loved the way my mouth cupped your vowels / like a spoonful of newly cooled soup. Marshall's poems rip language open and reassemble it as an homage to its impact and potential.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)