Kyle Carrero Lopez's MUSCLE MEMORY covers money & work, Blackness & anti-blackness, the art world, queerness, & violence—governmental to interpersonal—as it swerves through its colorful landscape. Lopez interrogates the various complications of earthly living in a sharp, fresh voice, returning again & again to the musical core of his poetics. Afro-Cuban drumming & disco & Solange commune as these poems ping-pong between reverent softness and unsparing critique. Equal parts jovial and furious, this is a debut with teeth. Winner of the PANK 2020 Book Contest. "Kyle Carrero Lopez's MUSCLE MEMORY is elastic. It crosses borders in flesh and mind, political and experimental, and codifies a personal realism. And this speaker journeys through lived imagery and music—rituals transfixed—remembrance."—Yusef Komunyakaa, author of The Emperor of Water Clocks Poetry. LGBTQ+ Studies. Latinx Studies. African & African American Studies.