Heart First Into This Ruin was published in hardcover paper-over-boards in June 2022. The endpapers match the light blue used on the cover for the title. The cover art is by Ken Price.

Wanda Coleman (b.1946 – d.2013) was an award-winning poet, novelist, and essayist born and raised in South Central Los Angeles. She was often called "the unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles." Coleman was the author of twenty books of poetry and prose, including Bathwater Wine, which was awarded the 1999 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the American Academy of Poets—the first book by an African American woman to receive the prize.

Heart First Into This Ruin was published by Black Sparrow Press in 2022 and includes an introduction by Mahogany L. Browne, the first ever poet-in-residence at New York City's Lincoln Center.

Coleman’s experimental “American Sonnet” series was borne from influences as diverse as Huey P. Newton and Herman Melville, Amiri Baraka, and Robert Duncan. Her fresh new form inspired countless others, from Terrance Hayes to Billy Collins. Coleman published one hundred sonnets between 1986 and 2001, and Heart First Into This Ruin marks the first time all of Coleman’s American Sonnets appeared together in one book.

For the cover design, Tammy Ackerman used Plaza and Bernhard Gothic. The interior is set in Palatino with Bernhard Gothic for titling. The cover art (just the black and white line drawing) is by Ken Price, whose art has been used many times for Black Sparrow Press books, including Heat Wave by Charles Bukowski, and The Plain of Smokes by Harvey Mudd.

While selecting poems for Coleman’s 2020 book Wicked Enchantment, the poet Terrance Hayes also made a series of drawings of Coleman. This is one of those drawings.

The Bernhard Gothic used on the cover is also brought inside for titling. The poems are set in Palatino.

Every Black Sparrow Press colophon now includes mention of the founders, John and Barbara Martin.

The back cover

Dancing on the Grave of a Son of a Bitch was published in hardcover paper-over-boards in March 2022. The endpapers match the purple used on the cover for the subtitle.

Diane Wakoski (b. 1937) is a groundbreaking poet and the author of more than sixty books. Wakoski’s conversational, sometimes seemingly informal work merges the confessional and deep image to create compelling, story-like poems.

In 1971, Wakoski published The Motorcycle Betrayal Poems to tremendous acclaim. She was just thirty-three years old. Black Sparrow Press published a new expanded edition in 2022 titled after one of the collection’s poems: Dancing on the Grave of a Son of a Bitch. The new hardcover edition includes an introduction by Elizabeth A.I. Powell, additional poems, and an afterword by the author.

For the cover design, Tammy Ackerman used ITC Bauhaus, splitting the I in “BITCH” to create a visual reference to road stripes, a nod to the book’s subtitle: The Complete Motorcycle Betrayal Poems. The interior is set in Palatino with Optima for titling.

Black Sparrow Press’s lead designer, Barbara Martin, often spread her title page designs across two pages. Martin retired in 2002, but her influence is evident here in Tammy Ackerman’s title page.

Given that most of the poems in this collection were written in the 1970s, the Optima titling is a nod to the era.

Every Black Sparrow Press colophon now includes mention of the founders, John and Barbara Martin.

The back cover

Soft cover edition, 1988.

Sherril Jaffe (b. 1945) is an award-winning short story writer and novelist. Her book The Unexamined Wife is about Ann, who “breaks up with her first husband, Ben, and tries to start a new life, first on her own and then married to Abraham.” It was first published by Black Sparrow Press in 1983. For the cover design, Barbara Martin used Peignot, complete with its unusual hybrid lowercase. The interior (shown here is only the colophon) is set in Trump-Mediäval.

Title page

Deluxe issue (1983) with patterned cloth backstrip and title label applied to spine.

Standard hardcover edition?

Once again, longtime Black Sparrow Press designer Barbara Martin combines fonts and colors that shouldn’t “work,” yet she pulls it off. This cover brings together caps from Britannic with distorted Brush Script.

Printed November 1991 in Santa Barbara & Ann Arbor for the Black Sparrow Press by Mackintosh Typography & Edwards Brothers Inc. Text set in Baskerville [not pictured] by Words Worth. Design by Barbara Martin. This edition is published in paper wrappers; there are 200 hardcover trade copies; 125 hardcover copies have been numbered & signed by the author; & 26 copies handound in boards by Earle Gray have been lettered & signed by the author.

Title page.