Vox Populi
A curated webspace for Poetry, Politics, and Nature with over 6,000,000 visitors since 2014 and over 9,000 archived posts.
Penelope Moffet: Peace March
Carry your light out into the shitstorm,
Joan Baez writes, and what a swirl of turds
it is. One protester drives her car
into another protester’s car and the one who’s hit
says No problem, don’t worry, it’s fine,
until she tries to drive away.
A man leans into his horn so enthusiastically
he guns into a curb and his tire explodes.
Other drivers honk and wave, a few with one finger.
None of us knows if it makes any sense
to be here, yet we gather once a month,
lift our signs, learn each other’s stories.
Today I’m jangled up inside, all rusty
wires and bolts, twisted metal scraps,
but I try to breathe deep, believe
the PEACE I wrote in foot-high
multi-colored chalk pastels on cardboard
carries light.
Poem (c) 2026 Penelope Moffet.
Born in Lorain, Ohio, Penelope Moffet has lived most of her life in Southern California. She is the author of three chapbooks, Cauldron of Hisses (Arroyo Seco Press, 2022), It Isn’t That They Mean to Kill You (Arroyo Seco Press, 2018) and Keeping Still (Dorland Mountain Arts, 1995). A full-length collection of her poetry will be published by Sheila-Na-Gig Editions in October 2026.
Discover more from Vox Populi
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Thank you Penelope & Michael–we need one another on paper and in the streets, yet again!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m happy to report that in Pittsburgh we have a large activist community that protests in various ways — demonstrations, speakers, letter writing, websites. I’m getting too old to march in the icy streets, but Eva and I participate in other ways.
LikeLiked by 1 person
We can’t all do everything. I do the marches when I can. No snow in Long Beach, but unfortunately we do have ICE.
LikeLike
I think protests are important because they are a communal light carrying those extended “gimme-an-F” roots on marching First-Amendment feet. But deeper still is that we protest because we can and while we can so that we indeed always can.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Exactly! Thanks, Matt.
>
LikeLike
“So that we always can.” Powerful
LikeLiked by 1 person
This poem opens a memory (and a constant fear) for me: we in Europe were so angry too at the time and grateful for Joan Baez, Bob Dylan of course, and so many more singers and groups who took on the baton. And now one feels frustrated and helpless – not only has nothing changed, but things got much, much worse. Once the war was aimed at foreign countries, now it’s aimed both outward and inward. And yet, as Penelope writes: “[…] believe / the PEACE I wrote in foot-high / multi-colored chalk pastels on cardboard / carries light.”
LikeLiked by 3 people
Yes, America is in a dark time, similar to what’s happened in other countries in the past: Germany, Argentina, Chile…
>
LikeLiked by 1 person
A very sweet and true poem about us all (isn’t it?) We discovered the reason We were there, Sharon and I, at our first roadside protest with a thousand others almost immediately. All the incidentals of the poem were “present” as well. But it was the feeling of sanity that has been so lacking in our recent lives. It was about feeling good again for the world, a kind of joyful containment of despair. We’ll be out there again for the next one, and the next until somehow this comes to an end and we learn to save ourselves.
LikeLiked by 4 people
Thanks, Sean. I’ve been to many protests over the last 50 years. I’m not sure whether they’ve stopped the government’s abuses of power, but the protests made me feel as if I’m doing something. It is important that our voices be heard. Perhaps now, with millions of people out on the streets protesting ICE, we will see change.
>
LikeLiked by 2 people