Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
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 Glenn ShaheenSomebody suggested I buy pickled
Herring in wine sauce— it didn't sound
Like a bad idea, all these conversations
Mired in capital's sloughed-off flesh.
By Lara Atallahafter Lebanon, a country with one of the worst economic crises since the nineteenth century
the price of bread has gone up again. throngs of cars
slouch towards shuttering gas stations. the currency, a farce
with each swing of the gavel, numbers
soar. fifty thousand pounds by day’s end,
what’s another ten thousand? or a hundred thousand?
a hundred and forty thousand pounds to the dollar?
By Noor HindiI won’t make metaphors out of fish. If I have to die, I choose the ocean. If I have to live, I choose you. You: Everyone I’ve ever mourned. I believe less & less of sunlight these days. I won’t die alone. To awaken crying is to awaken displaced. Ghost of your joy in the bathtub. A face in the mirror. Your nephew’s painting in the foyer.
By Hayan ChararaThe Arab apocalypse began around the year
of my birth, give or take—
the human apocalypse,
a few thousand years earlier.
By Emily K. MichaelThe speed reading class for seventh graders
slumped over tight columns of text spread flat
on tables in the library where in her half-glasses
By George Abrahammaybe if , ash & smolder way the – tongue own my in never but song this heard i've
– it birthed who fire the not & gospel become can , mouth right the in seen
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By Tarik DobbsChorus: Like a bridge over troubled water…
For years, settlers longingly, vertical, build over us, Starbucks has no sinks. Will we go? Lately, the bridge, their throne. When even these are somewhere to watch from, to drop a knee & propose somewhere to feel for a bank.
By Shatha AlmutawaWhen they ask you
How many days were you away?
Don’t say two weeks
They want to know the exact number
Tell them 11 days
By Noor Ibn Najamto become earth’s sugar, to be a seedless
orange offered. to want fruit
to unwind from the concept of sex