In Mercedes Wallace's debut poetry book "One Without The Other" she holds nothing back as she navigates her way through falling in love, falling out of love, and finding yourself all in the same place. Fresh off the heels of losing her Father, this collection is a labor of love with the middle chapter- Livingston- paying homage to him. Mercedes cracks open her diary to take you along with her as she moves through the waves of grief, resilience, and what it looks like to build yourself from the ground up. With imagery from personal text messages to create an intimate feel for the reader, she uses her raw poems as a connector to the very humanistic traits of failing, but moving forward nonetheless. And above all, the duality of light, and dark, love and loss- you cannot have one without the other.