dear white america
By Danez SmithDanez Smith performs "dear white america" at the 2014 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.
Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
By Danez SmithDanez Smith performs "dear white america" at the 2014 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.
By Aracelis GirmayWhen the boys are carnivals
we gather round them in the dark room
& they make their noise while drums
ricochet against their bodies & thin air
By Jamila WoodsPoems are bullshit unless they are eyeglasses, honey
tea with lemon, hot water bottles on tummies. I want
poems my grandma wants to tell the ladies at church
about. I want orange potato words soaking in the pot
By Pages d. Matamever seen the smile of a brown child
so loud it leaves Jericho shakin' in its overpriced boots
ever seen the smile of a brown child
so late the rest of the world still wanna catch up to its wind
By Ross GayIs that Eric Garner worked
for some time for the Parks and Rec.
Horticultural Department, which means,
perhaps, that with his very large hands,
By Brian Gilmorelike fidel after raiding
moncada barracks
we face history like
seed removed from
soil
By Rosa ChávezRi oj ab'aj xkoj qetal ruk'a k'atanalaj ch'ich'
Xk'at ri qab'aq'wach //
Las piedras fuimos marcadas con hierro candente
quemados nuestros ojos //
We, stones, were branded by hot iron
our eyes scorched
By Lois BeardsleeWhen I asked my mother
If she could remember
What her mother's mother called December
By Lourdes GalvánUtica is a pretty and quiet country
When I was at the bus station
my son would say to me, 'mom, I am hungry'
and a man who was sweeping came up to me
By Oliver de la PazThe way is written in the dark:
it has steel in it, something metallic, a gun,
a mallet, a piece of machinery--
something cold like the sea, something,