Sundress Reads: Review of And Yet Held

In T. De Los Reyes’s latest chapbook, And Yet Held (Bull City Press 2024), each poem feels like the lyrical embodiment of coming home and sinking into a soft mattress. This sensation arises not from an absence of stressors (as internalized body stigma and a fear of humiliation permeate this book), but from the way mundane objects and small acts of devotion are magnified in the speaker’s eyes.

Familiar comforts are found in tender scenes of domesticity and in speculative vignettes, where the supportive presence of a significant other and the invigorating beauty of everyday life encourage the speaker to talk unabashedly about her affection. Here, De Los Reyes refuses to dress love in the thickest of metaphors, preferring to offer it with generosity through personal anecdotes drawn from her life.

Whether the speaker is watching ice cubes melt slowly in her coffee or noticing the satisfied quirk at the corner of her partner’s lips, every observation is steeped in reverence and care. Attentiveness becomes a comfortable language for the speaker to express her admiration and gratitude, as well as signal her anxiety in moments of distress. The maturity required to admit these emotions is linked to the speaker’s feelings about intimacy.

While some of these poems document healing through glimmers of confidence amid self-doubt, they remain cognizant of how the body can carry the weight of its past. In “Gargantuan,” the speaker recalls, “My childhood / was a city where tenderness was frowned upon” (De Los Reyes 35), giving us a glimpse into the shame that stained her youth. This pervasive sense of unease only fades as her present comes into view. A calm arrives because, unlike before, she no longer feels alone: for “you are now / holding my body” (De Los Reyes 35). Seemingly minute, an embrace has enormous impact, making its recurrence in the book a constant source of joy. Readers will delight in witnessing the speaker grow flustered and make excuses so that “you can be / the big spoon when I just really [need] / to be held” (De Los Reyes 2), a confession that lays bare our desire for proximity, physical contact, and most of all, safety.

This tight-knit chapbook also sheds light on the ways we cradle each other beyond tactile means. One can “feel held” upon receiving a lover’s gentle gaze from across a room (De Los Reyes 1). Or, one can invite a partner to “hold fast” as they “roam in each other’s memory” (De Los Reyes 4). Through knowing glances and expressions of trust, De Los Reyes wields the word with renewed lucidity, reminding us of the opportunity to grant others the refuge that we ourselves seek. The task of making the world less daunting, she seems to say, is in our hands.

De Los Reyes is urgently aware that the time we have with the people we hold dear is fleeting, but she impressively never rallies against it; instead, the transience of life motivates her to slow down and savor each moment. This attitude is evident in her use of repetition, anaphora, and lists. In “Hard Heart”, De Los Reyes turns her appreciation inward:

Literary devices here allow past states to persist, insisting on their significance. Sometimes, they stress a powerful longing, while other times (as in the excerpts above), they are used to empower and acknowledge what the speaker has endured.

De Los Reyes also foregrounds the need for autonomy by anchoring many of her poems to a specific “I”—one who is inescapably conscious of her gender, weight, skin color, and Asian features. In a changing room, the speaker recalls, “He asks me for my dress size / and I hesitate” (De Los Reyes 29), and at a party, she remarks, “I’m what some / would call an acquired taste” (De Los Reyes 9). The decision to talk frankly about this “baggage” doesn’t drag the book down, rather it carries it, sharpening the speaker’s frustration and illuminating her relief.

This specificity spoke to me as a Filipino reader, who not only smirked in recognition of some typical Pinoy experiences, but saw myself reflected in the speaker’s gestures of affection, which could be as simple yet resonant as asking a loved one whether they’ve eaten. It got me thinking about my recent experience of moving out and realizing how much stuff I’d accumulated. It just seemed second nature—my habit of keeping everything I loved all clumped together, an impulse that could extend to the chapbook’s preoccupation with (re)collection and safekeeping.

A tour de force in tenderness, And Yet Held is a heartwarming display of devotion, vulnerability, and trust. De Los Reyes’s refreshing and imaginative fascination with the everyday offers solace amid hard times, making this the perfect book to read as you unwind after a long day. The chapbook’s commitment to immersion rather than distance serves as a needful reminder: that while it’s okay to be cautious about the people to whom we assign our care, we could be so much more sustained when we welcome others’ lives to touch and overlap and be held together with our own.

And Yet Held is available from Bull City Press

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Aylli Cortez (he/they) is a transmasc Filipino poet and creative writing graduate of Ateneo de Manila University, where he received a DALISAYAN Award in the Arts for Poetry in 2024. His debut chapbook, Unabandon, is forthcoming from Gacha Press in June 2025. His work has appeared in VERDANT Journal, en*gendered lit, Bullshit Lit, HAD, and like a field, among others. Based in Metro Manila, he is currently a poetry reader for ANMLY and a member of the Ateneo Press Review Crew. Find him online @1159cowboy or visit his website.