Angele Ellis: The life and legacy of Palestinian writer Refaat Alareer (1979-2023)
Refaat Alareer stands in a field in Gaza, holding a container of freshly picked strawberries. What evokes the earth’s sweetness more fully than a ripe berry? The expression on his face—scholarly, bespectacled—is gentle and tender.
Fred Shaw: The Pass
In the pass, a testy chef chews his lip
while zesting an orchard of green apple
over a peppery dish of risotto,
squinting his way to soigne by slicing
a plump of roast duck into a shingle
Matthew J. Parker: Pardon Me
The reason for the assault was absurd – an imagined slight over a game of cutthroat pinochle we had played earlier that day.
Dawn Potter: To the Republic
Those last moments, before the sun drops behind the hills,
you linger, not yet yourself—no darkness, no stars—
still waiting, waiting for the curtain to sigh shut
Baron Wormser: Bernie
Only one politician has come forward with a coherent response that he has taken to the people concerning what is occurring in the second administration of Donald Trump.
Mary Wollstonecraft: It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world!
I do not wish women to have power over men; but over themselves.
Minnita Daniel-Cox: The brief but shining life of Paul Laurence Dunbar, a poet who gave dignity to the Black experience
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Paul Laurence Dunbar: Invitation to Love
Come when my heart is full of grief
Or when my heart is merry;
Come with the falling of the leaf
Or with the redd’ning cherry.
Julia Conley: Thousands in Midwestern GOP Districts Attend Sanders’ First Stops on Tour to Fight Oligarchy
“The energy around what Bernie is doing is insane….”
George Yancy: Black History Testifies to the Impossible Creative Power of Black Resistance
Literary scholar Farah Jasmine Griffin discusses how Black yearning keeps surviving in the face of racist violence.
Baron Wormser: Salvation
On Flannery O’Connor, Donald Trump, and American Violence
William D. Hartung: In Stunningly Bright Colors
Enrico Muratore Aprosio’s Cry for Common Sense and Common Humanity,
Michael Simms: America
Beside the highway outside McKeesport PA
a state trooper has pulled over a black man
who leans against his rusty Ford
palms flat, feet apart
assuming the position
as we say in America
Abby Zimet: For Cruel, Stupid, Dastardly Deeds Done and Proposed
Gandhi famously said, “Civil disobedience therefore becomes a sacred duty when the State has become lawless.”
