Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
By Savannah SippleIn the beginning was the word and the word was FAT
in the beginning I was fat in the beginning I was lean &
long carried two weeks past due & wore preemie clothes & then I
chunked up baby fat a fat baby baby I grew big
By Emmy PérezThey are the ones who were told their children
were taken to bathe—and not returned. They
are the ones whose nursing babies and toddlers
were forced to wean and left in wet diapers.
By Sheila BlackWe come at the wrong time of year by a hair
or a week, and the brown birds flying onward,
out of reach. My son tilts his head.
By Nickole BrownWhen I press my face to the painted box,
the sound is
not buzzing, is not
a mob of wings.
By Deborah ParedezThe English translation of my surname is walls
misspelled, the original s turned to its mirrored
twin, the z the beginning of the sound for sleep.
By Shabnam Piryaeia young man desperately buries himself under damp leaves while helicopters hunt him police laugh as he tries to hide in the foliage a neighbor with a device to eavesdrop on scanners catches this tidbit
By Yona HarveyThere was a river turned to Goddess. Was kin to river turned to Flame.
As a child I dreamt that river. None could keep me from that vision.
They lowered me in the Mighty Waters. Lowered me in the Creek of Shame.
By Frank X WalkerWe knew to tiptoe quietly
if mama was on the land line
using her full lips to parse out
each syllable, carefully measuring
her words as if they were being
eye-balled and weighed
on the other end.
