Vox Populi

A curated webspace for Poetry, Politics, and Nature with over 6,000,000 visitors since 2014 and over 9,000 archived posts.

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

December 16, 2023 · 4 Comments

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

December 15, 2023 · Leave a comment

Norman Solomon: Want to Understand Israel-Palestine? Consume Noam Chomsky, Not Corporate Media

“If you assume that there is no hope, you guarantee that there will be no hope. If you assume there is an instinct for freedom, that there are opportunities to change things, then there is a possibility that you can contribute to making a better world.”

December 15, 2023 · 4 Comments

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.” 

December 14, 2023 · 4 Comments

John Feffer: Rescuing Realpolitik from Henry Kissinger

Kissinger is gone. Let’s put to rest his toxic legacy as well by purging geopolitics of his antiquated notions of amorality.

December 12, 2023 · Leave a comment

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

December 11, 2023 · 6 Comments

Patricia A. Nugent: Dog Poop

His veiled threat obviously didn’t shut me up; I can’t let it. As Audre Lourde reminds us, “Your silence will not protect you.” 

December 9, 2023 · 14 Comments

Penny Rosenwasser: A Jewish American Says “Not in My Name!”

On my desktop is a photo of seven Palestinian babies at Al-Shifa Hospital, lying next to each other on a bed. Lacking fuel, nurses had moved 36 babies from their … Continue reading

December 7, 2023 · 18 Comments

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.”

December 6, 2023 · 9 Comments

Clarence Lusane: Make America Fascist Again (MAFA!)

The Future If Donald Trump Returns to the Oval Office

December 6, 2023 · 7 Comments

Jake Johnson: UAW Becomes Largest US Union to Back Gaza Cease-Fire

Fresh off historic contract victories, the United Auto Workers on Friday became the largest U.S. union to endorse a cease-fire in Gaza as Israel resumed its bombardment of the Palestinian territory following a weeklong pause.

December 4, 2023 · 2 Comments

Barbara Hamby: Ode to Anglo Saxon, Film Noir, and the Hundred Thousand Anxieties That Plague Me Like Demons in a Medieval Christian Allegory 

Yo, Viking dudes, who knew your big-dog cock-of-the-walk
raping and pillaging would put us all here, right smack
dab in the middle of a decade filled with the stink
of war.

December 3, 2023 · 17 Comments

George Yancy: When Philosophy No Longer Smells of the Earth

In these times of narrow ideological allegiances and goose-stepping conformity, philosophers who ask “why?” as a challenge to the status quo are asking an unsafe question. And that fact, more than anything else, shows us why we need philosophy in times like these.

December 3, 2023 · 6 Comments

Video: Gorgeous Portraits of the World’s Vanishing People

In his quest to photograph endangered cultures, Jimmy Nelson has endured Kalishnikov-toting Banna tribesmen, subzero reindeer attacks, and thousands of miles of hard travel. With a blend of humility and humor, Nelson won the trust of each of his subjects, using an antique plate camera to create stunning portraits of 35 indigenous tribes.

December 2, 2023 · 3 Comments

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