Vox Populi

A curated webspace for Poetry, Politics, and Nature with over 6,000,000 visitors since 2014 and over 9,000 archived posts.

Rebecca Gordon: On Seeking Asylum and Refuge

In a Hostile United States

Featured · 3 Comments

Tony Gloeggler: Bridges (1994)

…he stops in front of you,
extends his hand and says,
“Satch Paige is my name.”

Featured · 23 Comments

Woody Lewis: Sally Hemings and the Road to Curdsville

I have memories of the apartheid signs on all the restaurants and public facilities. A white person who grew up in the area at that time recently corrected me: “Those weren’t apartheid signs, those were Jim Crow signs.”

Featured · 1 Comment

Catherine Gonick: Gazing at a Model of Australopithecus

She might have clung to her freedom
to live among leaves a while longer,
in paradise not quite lost.

Featured · 3 Comments

Theia Chatelle:  Indigenous-Led Collectives Are Keeping Minnesotan Communities Safe From ICE

Members of the American Indian Movement and the Many Shields Warrior Society are patrolling the streets of Minneapolis.

Featured · 10 Comments

James Baldwin: A Talk to Teachers

The obligation of anyone who thinks of himself as responsible is to examine society and try to change it and to fight it—at no matter what risk. This is the only hope society has. This is the only way societies change.

Featured · 1 Comment

Ma Yongbo: Three poems for Helen Pletts in English & Chinese

No one can walk here,
save shy deer, save wind and rain,
save those invisible wings
that can gently lift the whole garden
up to the constellations.

February 10, 2026 · 18 Comments

Diego Ramos: Academic Freedom | Trump’s University Blackmail Results

Universities in 2025 proved that the federal government can indeed blackmail academic institutions by withholding federal funds and forcing schools not only to give money to the government but also fundamentally alter the way their campuses operate.

February 9, 2026 · 18 Comments

Laure-Anne Bosselaar: Lassitude

the stars barely visible above the oil rigs off the coast,
aglow like phantom ships

February 9, 2026 · 42 Comments

Octavia E. Butler: A Few Rules For Predicting The Future

‘All I did was look around at the problems we’re neglecting now and give them about 30 years to grow into full-fledged disasters.’

February 8, 2026 · 11 Comments

Audio: W.S. Merwin reads “In Time”

and started to dance without music
slowly we danced around and around
in circles and after a while we hummed
when the world was about to end

February 8, 2026 · 20 Comments

Video: Inside, The Valley Sings

Trapped in the never-ending horror of solitary confinement, three prisoners in the United States seek comfort and escape in the boundless landscapes of their own imaginations.

February 7, 2026 · 10 Comments

Jordan Smith: Tattoo

The tattoo place was in the strip mall
Between the pizza shop and the liquor store,
Where all during Covid he bought
His tequila because the owner played
Old blues on the stereo and kept his distance

February 7, 2026 · 11 Comments

Caitlin Scialla: Meet the Top 7 Oligarchs Controlling Your Online News

The internet has not democratized news in any meaningful way; instead, the media monopoly has simply migrated to digital spaces.

February 6, 2026 · 9 Comments

Robinson Jeffers: Night

Over the dark mountain, over the dark pinewood,
Down the long dark valley along the shrunken river,
Returns the splendor without rays, the shining of shadow

February 6, 2026 · 21 Comments

Archives