Review: “Hereafter” by Kevin Young

Reviewed on 8/10/2025

★★★★☆

Kevin Young offers us glimpses into a near-death experience on a plane. The poem’s indented lines and scattered stanzas symbolize both physical and emotional turbulence. He recounts the plane’s radical motions: “descended,” “rise again,” “exiled back,” “orbited.” The passengers swing between hope and despair like frightened birds searching for a place to anchor. The poem magnifies this suspension with intense imagery (“In that emptied, electric air/ some wept.”). They linger in the space between horror and nothingness. This short moment ends up defining their entire life.

Later stanzas describe a sense of awe in the aftershock. Young narrates moments right after the incident: “we fetched/ my luggage orbiting/… We drove/ home in snow deep.” This sudden return to his ordinary life contrasts with earlier uneasiness; he speaks in detachment, illuminating “this little/ living light.” Young highlights this sense of haziness following death’s gift of life. Being alive feels like a surreal mirage. Something once felt unimaginable is given back to you again in a sudden. Underlying this peaceful tone is, thus, an unsettling yet powerful current. The last stanza quietly meditates, “marvelling/ at our singed,/ wounded wings,” that humbling sensation of survival forever carved into the future.

Full Poem: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/1690317/hereafter