Philip Levine: Belle Isle, 1949
We stripped in the first warm spring night
and ran down into the Detroit River
to baptize ourselves in the brine
of car parts, dead fish, stolen bicycles,
melted snow.
Joy Gaines-Friedler: Detroit
I think of the sound of factories in the voice
of an old boyfriend from The Cass Corridor –
cocoon of his attic bedroom, mattress on the floor,
candle light and books in that long season of snow
Video: Joe Biden and Elizabeth Alexander discuss “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden
President-elect Joe Biden, poet Elizabeth Alexander, psychologist Angela Duckworth, and a chorus of working fathers and sons join Poetry in America host Elisa New to reflect on Robert Hayden’s sonnet “Those Winter Sundays.”
George Drew: I Know You’re in Detroit
Aretha, I apologize for having never written a poem
for or about you, not in all the Hit Parades of years
I’ve grooved to you…
Terry Blackhawk: A Poet in Every School
The Inside Out Literary Arts Program is in its fourth year at Detroit’s Marcus Garvey K-8 Academy and, thanks to a determined group of parent activists who obtained a grant from … Continue reading
Vox Populi 
Laura Gottesdiener: A Foreclosure Conveyor Belt
The Continuing Depopulation of Detroit Unlike so many industrial innovations, the revolving door was not developed in Detroit. It took its first spin in Philadelphia in 1888, the brainchild of … Continue reading →