“A collection unlike any I have ever encountered before. Part primer, part activated art space, part personal/community inventory, part lyric collaboration with mental illness— this book activates new zones between disability studies and poetry, allowing readers spaces for rest, recognition, and reimagination inside its dazzling and varied forms. An extraordinary document in care, mutual aid, and access.”
— Claudia Rankine
“Never before have I experienced a book of poems that cares this firmly and boldly, this inventively and fully for its communities and for its reader… I felt my entire world shift”
— Chen Chen
“Full of vulnerability and humor and lyrical play… Hardly Creatures is a beautiful space I want to return to again and again”
— Jane Wong
“An impressive titan of formalism and radical inclusion.” — Electric Literature, A Most Anticipated Debut Poetry Collections of 2025
“Brilliant and innovative… a visionary new voice in poetry” — Tin House
Forthcoming May 20, 2025
“Colgate wields their intuitive poetical force in vibrant theatrical scenes… Deliciously strange, deliciously heart wrenching—this book radiates pure magic.”
—Felicia Zamora
“A Boystown house party you won’t soon forget… a messy and moving meditation on care, disability, and queerness; on the cruel promises of empire; and, especially, on outsized and lopsided love.”
— Chad Bennett