Monica Duffy Toft: Overconfidence is how wars are lost − lessons from Vietnam, Afghanistan and Ukraine were ignored
Wars are rarely lost first on the battlefield. They are lost in leaders’ minds…
Philip Terman: Tell Them Everything
Lucky she was, not to spend time in an Iranian
Jail, fortunate to emigrate and meet my brother
And fall in love, a Jew and an Iranian
Video: Israeli And Palestinian Mothers Walk Barefoot For Peace In Rome Streets
The activists demanded an end to violence, emphasizing that mothers everywhere want their children to live in dignity and safety.
Philip Levine: Blue
the men wakening one
at a time and reaching for
both the sky and the earth
Rebecca Gordon: American Gulag
We know we can dismantle the American gulag, because some of us are already doing it. It’s time for the rest of us to get to work.
James Crews: The Pond at Sunset
I forget I’ve already arrived
in the life I want, and that I am
still arriving at the same time.
Michael Simms: Apologies for the tech glitches at Vox Populi Sphere
Friends, odd things have been happening with the Vox Populi website lately.
Andrew Reginald Hairston: On Building
I lost my second election on March 3, 2026…. I’m just getting started.
Alison Hurwitz: Submerged
the story run across his skin, his mind a moving wheel
that cannot stop its circling, bearing down the road
with grackle wings, a story leafing past each turning
Eman Abu Zayed: With Gaza’s Libraries in Ruins, Palestinians Fight to Preserve Historical Memory
More than 87 public libraries and archives in Gaza have been partially or completely destroyed by Israel’s genocide.
Ma Yongbo: Frost on the Window
It is spring now and the frost on the window is gradually thinning.
Senator Bernie Sanders: I spoke to AI agent Claude
I spoke to Anthropic’s AI agent Claude about AI collecting massive amounts of personal data and how that information is being used to violate our privacy rights. What an AI agent says about the dangers of AI is shocking and should wake us up.
Dorianne Laux: The Optimism of French Toast
I think of my Acadian ancestors
landing on the shores of Nova Scotia, divining
logs from the deep woods, fashioning windows,
hanging laundry from two oars dug into sand—
the flags of domesticity flayed by the wind.
Michael Simms: Trump’s Nightmare
Who is James Talarico, and why does the Trump administration fear him?
