Michele Battiste: 101st Note on Violence
Cast iron: iconic. Romantic
even. Well oiled. Seasoned. But far
too heavy. Fatal. Certainly. If wielded.
Determination or luck.
Baron Wormser: Dark Time
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.
That place among the rocks—is it a cave,
Or winding path? The edge is what I have.
Alison Luterman: What I Learned
singing’s made of sweat and spittle,
tears and snot, hot breath,
and the soggy crumb of a potato chip left
in a back corner of your unflossed tooth
Video: American Seams | The Plains
The stories of three quilters combine to reveal an intimate portrait of rural women in the American West. Featuring Brenda Bailey, Sara Buscaglia, and Susan “Traditional Woman” Hudson.
Michael Simms: The Skateboarder
Not sport but defiance
Not lifestyle but thrust and risk
A kick, an aversion to common sense
Matthew J. Parker: Cancer Dancers
I met Gerenith in 2006. Found her on a dating website that featured women from Cali, Colombia, aka the Salsa Capital of the World.
Laure-Anne Bosselaar and Kurt Brown: “Yonder” by Herman de Coninck
I seek a village.
And in it a house. And in it a
room, in which a bed, in which a woman.
And in that woman a lap.
Abby Zimet: We Shall Not Be Moved Chap. 784
50 faith leaders gathered at the ICE facility to link their arms, block the entrance, demand information on conditions inside and declare, “This is not acceptable” – after which they were set upon by goons.
Sean Sexton: Planting Aeschynomene Seed
It pours from a muslin sack like sunlight
through a cracked window shade, fifty pounds
to a metal washtub, old as your footsteps.
Derrick Z. Jackson: A Cruel Tradeoff | Building the “Amazon of Deportation” While Tearing Down Health and Human Services
The Trump administration wants to spend $45 billion to build an inhumane deportation industry while planning to cut at least $40 billion in life-saving programs from the Department of Health and Human Services
Mary B. Moore: Amanda and the News, c. 2016
I’m old as stones and not as solid.
Gloria fritters a while
and fiddles my left eardrum,
a tickle not a hum.
Marianne Dhenin: Educators Resist Trump’s Fascist Agenda
More than 49 million young people attend public schools in the United States, and they have all been thrust into the center of President Donald Trump’s regressive agenda as he moves to use education funding as political leverage.
Thomas McGuire: Garden Plots
I’ve come to half believe what Ho Chi Minh
said about his need for more poets
who could lead a charge, sharpen bayonets.
