THE FIRE AND THE GHOST

*The Fire and the Ghosts* by JD Johnson is a stark, mythic chronicle of endurance and transformation. Forged in grief and tempered by memory, these poems trace the journey of a man who learns to carry his darkness without surrendering to it. Johnson’s elemental voice, shaped by the silences and landscapes of the Midwest, turns loss into language and pain into testament. Through elegy, reflection, and myth, he becomes the Shadow‑Bearer — a figure who rises from the ashes, teaching the night the name of the man it could not claim. This collection is a haunting meditation on survival, love, and the quiet fire that refuses to die.