The Origins of Streams

What happens if we imagine beyond the confines of what we are told is possible? This question runs through the hearts of the poems in Rachel Economy's The Origins of Streams. Glimmers of answers emerge in conversations and overlaps with animals, plants, the soil itself. The Origins of Streams invites the reader into sensory awakening as a human body within the bigger body of the world. Whether the topic is chronic illness, creation myths, heartbreak, or the ethics of big agribusiness, these poems queer and dissolve the (often artificial) separations placed between the human and non-human world. Love poems are populated with plants. Decomposition and the movement of matter become essential processes for reorganizing the world towards justice. Grief and loss offer richness and regrounding in ecological relationship between watersheds and human bodies. Food is a tapestry that grows and graces tables and words throughout. More than anything, these poems speak deeply to what being alive feels like, and what being alive could be. Moving from land-as-origin-story, through themes of dancing, apocalypse, animacy, and refuge, Rachel Economy immerses us in the body of now, and in the seeds of a fragmented and thriving future.