Everyone I Love, Alive

"Reading Bayani’s tender, searing collection is like bearing witness to a modern-day harana: a lover under the beloved’s window, singing out from the heart. Only here the beloved is the world; the future; the possibility of liberation. Bayani’s lucid, questing poems sing to these endangered things with a voice full of heartache, fury and hope—knowing too that a serenade, like any poem, is a way to share the breath of life. These poems do just that: they see that which is nearly lost, nearly gone and then they go to work—they resuscitate."
  -- Elaine Castillo, author of :America Is Not the Heart" and "How to Read Now and Moderation"
"This is—dare I say—Bayani’s most mystical book, a mighty alchemy of prayer and fury that was, for me, an invitation to feel with the honesty of water. A loss beyond language pulses through these poems; in its wake, a homecoming to stillness that’s deeply reparative and surprisingly thrilling. As always, Bayani is a tender witness to history’s brutality and beauty, which feels like a call to (now more than ever) remain human. Everyone I Love, Alive is vintage Bayani: loving, broken, broken open, capacious, searching, and shot through with an aching and 'audacious light.'"
  -- Brynn Saito, author of "Under a Future Sky"
"Bayani’s third book Everyone I love, Alive, is a triumph. The poems in this collection vibrate with the urgency of a dying world inviting the reader into a living present. This book holds cities, mythology, and memory. This book is brimming with questions that tear at the very fabric of our knowing and asks us to still love the world. If you’re new to the Jason Bayani Fandom this is the perfect place to start, welcome."
  -- Sam Sax, author of "Yr Dead" and "Pig"