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POETRY | COMING APRIL 2026
THE SUN HAS SHIFTED AS HAVE I
Poems
by JONATHAN T. BAILEY
“Bailey’s poems hold a wisdom that feels desperately needed in our times.”
—SUNNI BROWN WILKINSON, Rodeo
A lyric reckoning with the radical possibility of joy.
Jonathan T. Bailey maps the process of transformation, weaving themes of longing, belonging, and self-discovery. Set against the beauty of the West where the buzz of cicadas and the song of the hermit thrush echo across the desert, the collection draws power from the land’s ability to hold both desolation and renewal. Bailey’s poetry embraces contradiction as essential to healing, refusing to separate pain from beauty or vulnerability from strength. Rather than offering closure, these poems reveal how wholeness is forged through emotional risk and the clarity gained by facing oneself fully.
Trade Paper Original | ISBN: 9798890920362 | $16.95 | 84 pp | Trim: Trim: 6 x 9” | April 2026
“Bailey offers a glimpse into longing and introspection, all viewed through a queer lens that provides a unique and meaningful perspective on the natural world.”
—CAL CROSBY, The King’s English Bookshop
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JONATHAN T. BAILEY is the author of the literary memoir When I Was Red Clay: A Journey of Identity, Heality, and Wonder and co-author of The Greater San Rafael Swell. His work has been published in Archaeology Southwest, The Salt Lake Tribune, Indian Country Today, and more. As an artist and conservation photographer Jonathan’s works turn an eye to the Utah desert that forged him. He lives in Tucson, Arizona.
PRAISE FOR THE SUN HAS SHIFTED AS HAVE I
“Bailey’s poems hold a kind of wisdom that feels desperately needed in our times. Whether it’s examining his own queerness, the vibrant and startling natural world, or the strangeness of living, each poem is expertly crafted and echoes Whitman’s primal desire to 'sing the body electric.'”
—SUNNI BROWN WILKINSON, Rodeo
"I felt vines growing up my body as I read this collection, pulling me into a lush world of spells and prayers. Like the branches of an elder oak, each poem's line is weighty and deliberate. This book will swallow you and never spit you out."
—ROBIN GOW, Lanternfly August and Our Lady of Perpetual Degeneracy
“Gorgeous and raw. This collection is bursting with love born from Bailey's delicate attention to and celebration of the one world we will ever call home.”
—MORGAN SJOGREN, Path of Light
“Skillfully placing moments of joy and grief unique to the queer biography in conversation with the intricacies and oddities of the natural world, Bailey makes what should no longer be (but nevertheless is) a radical assertion—that queer lives, our lives, are as natural as weather. These poems are unflinching, imminently readable, and unafraid."
—SEAN PATRICK MULROY, Hated for the Gods
“Bailey's connection to places and living things is a contagious wonder in these concentrated offerings.”
—KIM SHUCK, Poet Laureate of San Francisco Emerita
“What a capacious invitation to attend to the sentient, singing earth! These verses leave us less lonely, more warmly and queerly connected. Each poem is a prayer and a dare to take action. The world is not only counting on us, but counting on us to create more love.”
—NAN SEYMOUR, Prayers Not Meant for Heaven
“Reader, hurry into this joy so deep it feels like grieving.”
—TC TOLBERT, Gephyromania
“Poetry is an ember, older, deeper, and more rigorous than the discipline of literature. In Bailey’s breath, it rises like a ‘flare/ from one limit of yourself/ to the other’. Be grateful for all that becomes visible in the arc of that light.”
—FARID MATUK, Moon Mirrored Indivisible
ALSO BY THE AUTHOR
WHEN I WAS RED CLAY: A Journey of Identity, Healing, and Wonder
This intimate record lays bare one person’s experience growing up in a rural Mormon community and struggling to reconcile his sexual orientation with the religious doctrine of his childhood. Finding solace and connection in wild places, Jonathan T. Bailey lived two lives—one of trauma, the other of wonder. In When I Was Red Clay, he navigates self–discovery, grief, and the loss of faith with unflinching honesty and biting humor.
"Bailey's moving testament of resilience is sure to satisfy readers of nature writing and autobiography alike.”
—PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
