"To read mahogany is to st/roll with a new friend. The poems are as much tirade as they are tender telling, as much lyric blitz as spoken invitations to a way of surviving..."–Divya Victor, author of Curb
"erica lewis melds the raw emotions of love, loss, death, anxiety, and joy into a solid tribute to black endurance, her daily life and the heart of her history. Her dynamic phrasing riffs on her experiences like a praise song."–Lyn Ford, storyteller, poet, writer/Ohio Arts Council and the National Association of Black Storytellers
"In the tight-lined poems of mahogany, the repetitiveness of longing cycles into the brave insights of despair. After all, 'what is grief' one poem notes, 'if not preserving/love.' Like the Diana Ross's songs through which the poet refracts her own story, intense grief and love turn these poems 'inside out' until, sometimes, 'all that's left is joy'."–Camille T. Dungy, author of Trophic Cascade