Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
By Javier ZamoraHis grandma made the best pupusas, the counselor wrote next to Stick-Figure Abuelita
(I’d colored her puffy hair black with a pen).
Earlier, Dad in his truck: “always look gringos in the eyes.”
Mom: “never tell them everything, but smile, always smile.”
By Lena Khalaf TuffahaBehind the walls of your jails we wait
heartbeats audible now, muffled thuds
above the current of blood running thin
By Destiny O. BirdsongOr maybe you weren’t. Whenever I’m frightened,
anything can become a black woman in a granite dress:
scaffold for what’s to come: blue lights exploding
like an aurora at the base of the bridge;
By Purvi ShahYou had a name no one
could hold between their
teeth. So they pronounced
By Joseph RossWhen you walk past Klans-
men, smiling at you
on your way into the court
house, wondering how
By Keno Evolthe night i was to meet my brother for the first time in 23 years he ain’t show / absence is not what comes up from that memory / more it was the dusk in September / how fog can hide a growl
By Dominique ChristinaDominique Christina performs the poem "Mothers of Murdered Sons" at the 2016 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.
By Jen Hoferwhat dateless body what we exacted or nixed or hexed in the eternal present of not being able to – what not being able to not be considered garbage or trashed by the bag
