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A debut collection by an award-winning spoken-word poet that reflects the multifaceted nature of queer Indigenous lived experience.
If the Fire Spoke Back inhabits the space between existential dread and radiance; these are poems that explore the tension between traditional knowledge in colonial institutions, desire, and the profound ways in which writing can compel us to consider our place in the world.
Lafortune's traditional name, Gchi-Waabshkaa Mukwa, speaks to the weaving between worlds, and provides the frame for his writing and storytelling. Along with inspiration drawn from contemporary spirit-led poetry, the poems shift from the symbolism of fire as destruction to one of fire as an ancestor. Lafortune, acting as a vessel, draws on ancestral gifts and inheritances to translate the words revealed to him, even as he questions the role of fire as an agent of change. Bright and bursting with energy, If the Fire Spoke Back pushes the boundaries of Western literature.
Connor Lafortune is a queer Anishinaabek storyteller from Dokis First Nation and la Rivière-des-Français. In 2023, he released a single in collaboration with G.R. Gritt titled Qui crie au loup? which speaks back to the villainization of queer bodies. In 2025, he co-edited A Thousand Tiny Awakenings, a youth-led poetic anthology through Latitude 46 Publishing. He recently co-released Can You Feel It Now? a poetic short film on Black and Indigenous resilience, which won the Outstanding Northern Ontario Short Film at Cinéfest and featured at the Red Nation International Film Festival, the Vancouver International Black Film Festival, and recently at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), among others. He currently lives in Dokis First Nation, Ontario.