Shade is a place
“Shade is a place” by MaKshya Tolbert is a collection of poetry published by Penguin Group on November 4, 2025. This 96-page work explores the concept of a “Black sense of place” in Charlottesville, Virginia, weaving together themes of urban planning, architectural history, and personal reflection. The poems invite readers to engage with their surroundings, encouraging a deeper awareness of both the external environment and inner thoughts.
In this collection, Tolbert employs lyric walking poems and Bashō-style travelogue to create a rich tapestry of experiences. The work meanders through the Downtown Mall, focusing on the interplay between arboreal life and personal introspection. Readers will find a blend of observations about street trees and the significance of shade, as well as contemplative moments that resonate with the complexities of place and identity.
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From National Poetry Series winner MaKshya Tolbert, a “startlingly original debut” (Maggie Millner) that meanders toward possibilities of arboreal relief among entanglements of place, property, and urban planning in Charlottesville, Virginia
Shade is a place meanders east–west along Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall, seeking “a Black sense of place” at the pace of stressed shade and street trees, the mall’s architectural history, and the speaker’s ongoing questions and reflections. The collection of poems is a moving invitation to open one’s attention by looking up, down, and always within. Through lyric walking poems (“tree walks” and “shade walks”) and Bashō-style travelogue, Shade is a place unfolds as much through arboreal life as through one’s inner life—sometimes alone, sometimes with others, and always among turning trees.
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