Painted Blue with Saltwater | Logan February

It is so refreshing to discover a poet as rapturously rich with magic as Logan February. In Painted Blue with Saltwater, the poet swims with sea monsters, becomes a feather, becomes a window, becomes a safe house by the sea. This is the great pleasure of Logan’s poetry—whatever lamentable situation the speaker finds themself in, there is always a way to shapeshift back toward the light: “Because I am / void & because I am vast & because / I am ocean.” What welcome gifts, these gorgeous poems.

—Kaveh Akbar