Just Is - Where There Are Black People in the Future
By Jaden FieldsIt is the steadiest “I love you”
Until the moon loses their footing in the sky
Which is to say - never
Or
I love you beyond time
Or
I love me beyond time
Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
By Jaden FieldsIt is the steadiest “I love you”
Until the moon loses their footing in the sky
Which is to say - never
Or
I love you beyond time
Or
I love me beyond time
By féi hernandezSimultaneously I am
alone and crowded, this…
the pulsing wound of being extinct,
whole
enough for a morning forage,
yet scant for the onlookers
of lineage,
of nation,
myths in the mulberry tree.
By Janine Mogannam“I’m
pretty awful, all things considered. A few weeks ago
I couldn’t eat anything and now I’m constantly starving.
I know that’s a terrible thing to say.
I think my house plants might be dying but I’m not really sure?
They’re sad and limp-necked. I guess that’s a metaphor.
By Summer FarahMy beloved city. We are the lucky ones. We worship a woman immortalized by stone, her trek impossible now. Our realms are severed by sky. Oh, what blood have we forgotten? Even when the sun sets the same monsters patrol our streets.
By Jose Hernandez DiazI’m not sure if you knew it at the time, but you showed us, your younger siblings,
A great example. Maybe you were just happy going away to college,
Away from the responsibilities of watching over younger siblings all the time,
But I always remembered having pride when I’d tell people my sister
Is an English major and even more so when you became a teacher.
By Tala Khanmalekhere, in this place,
we do not describe each other as family,
or even, as chosen
family. here, in this place,
we reckon with the ongoing past.
By Jessica AbughattasBecause curfews of
Because strip search at the checkpoint into
Because grandmother’s undergarments splayed on
Because two men with guns on the way to
Because grandmother saves plastic Coke liters to
Because the water could without notice be
By Dare WilliamsAt the Best Western, he arrived in a Ford
with its burned-out back. We spent the day
driving while he pointed at ruins
of cars gutted on the dead lawns.
By antmen pimentel mendozaThe memory palace has an all gender bathroom
and I’m not the middle figure in the half-skirt,
half-pants chimera outfit, but I do like to piss
in a single-stall situation. On the couch
is the heavy blanket that kept me Catholic. Going
up the stairs is an act of poise and in the kitchen
is a lemon, wedged and pledged. Under the bed
is the laser printed felt, the earrings I drew
onto my lobes and my cheeks flush, burning.
By Walela NehandaI am run ragged by another woman’s
immunity transplanted inside me.
I am not myself on a cellular level.
Somewhere, in my biology.
I am in Greece. I am a good woman.
Thirty five and Santorini chic.