Inside groundbreaking author Nikki Giovanni's final collection of poems, notes and letters

Celebrated poet Nikki Giovanni published more than 30 books during her lifetime, and nearly a year after her death comes her final collection.“The New Book,” out now, serves as both an elegy and a continuation of her decadeslong career.

Celebrated poet Nikki Giovanni published more than 30 books during her lifetime, and nearly a year after her death comes her final collection.

“The New Book,” out now, serves as both an elegy and a continuation of her decadeslong career. Completed before she died last year and shepherded to print by her wife, Virginia “Ginney” Fowler, this collection carries Giovanni’s work into a future that she knew she would not live to see due to her declining health, Fowler said.

“All the poems were written before the election,” Fowler said. “Nikki wanted to get people to vote.”

The book folds wisdom into instruction, speaking to the political landscape, her childhood in Knoxville, Tennessee, and the stories of her great-grandmother, who was a slave. Each poem insists on accountability, intention and action.

Jericho Brown, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and mentee of Giovanni’s, said the new collection shows “even more of who she always was.”