Albert Garcia: Ice
Between the Sierras
in the distance and a faint film
of clouds, the sun rises
red like the gills of a salmon.
Video: Poetry by Pashtun Women of Afghanistan
For centuries, Pashtun women have traded stories, feelings and life wisdom in the form of two-line oral poems called landai or landays. Eliza Griswold, a journalist and poet, traveled to … Continue reading
William Blake: The Human Abstract
Pity would be no more If we did not make somebody poor, And Mercy no more could be If all were as happy as we. And mutual fear brings Peace, … Continue reading
Bhikshuni Sela: The Gate
Ever since I invited my own death into bed with me, I no longer feel lonely or afraid of the dark.
Abby Zimet: A Hand Here, A Head There | Israel’s Tremendously Positive War In Gaza
The “systematic effort to empty Gaza of its people,” warns Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, “will haunt this region (and) define generations to come.”
Mosab Abu Toha: Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear
When you open my ear, touch it
gently.
My mother’s voice lingers somewhere inside.
Lisa Suhair Majaj: Living in History
Whatever the skins we live in,
the names we choose, the gods we claim or disavow,
may we be like grains of sand on the beach at night
Yehoshua November: Hearing Roy Orbison in a Mikvah in Salem, MA
To submerge beneath the water,
the mystics add,
is to return to the Divine womb,
the way the soul returns to the Heavens each night
as the body dozes.
Video: Birdsong | The dying whistled language of the Hmong people in northern Laos
Exploring the whistling traditions of the Hmong people of northern Laos, whose language straddles the boundary between music and speech, this film witnesses a collision of ancient tradition with modern … Continue reading
Edna St. Vincent Millay: The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver
A wind with a wolf’s head
Howled about our door,
And we burned up the chairs
And sat on the floor.
Robert Frost: The Wood-Pile
And it was older sure than this year’s cutting,
Or even last year’s or the year’s before.
The wood was gray and the bark warping off it
And the pile somewhat sunken.
Michael Simms: Sometimes I Wake Early
Last night we took a friend for a walk along the edge
of our mountain. She looked out
over the city, the rivers, the sultry slopes
crowded with sumac and maple
and said So you know where you live
Sandy Solomon: Diary from a Tomato Cannery, 1912
I walked part way home with a girl of ten
who’d peeled tomatoes from 6 am
to 6:30 in the evening.
“Things to eat is so high,” she said.
“We can’t go to school. We gotter work.”
