Exit signs on a seaside highway by Lara Atallah

Exit signs on a seaside highway contemplates fragmented territory set against the backdrop of an ongoing apocalypse. The poems both acknowledge the raw violence created by borders, while stubbornly searching for glimpses of a better world that lies within reach. With language that is confrontational but also hopeful, it invites us to liberate ourselves from structures that are far more fragile than we believe them to be. Subverting patriotism and place, Exit signs on a seaside highway invites us to plunge into the painful depths borders create. Atallah wants to know why we’re“in love with a place that chronically guts itself,” aware that there is “something delicious about [the] intensity” of that allegiance. Part ode, part obituary, part manual, Exit builds on its hard truths: “the scales are broken” and “history doesn’t repeat, patterns do.” But a tender reality continues to search for art in its healing. Atallah knows we can “easily weave an epic tale from the fragments left behind