Do You Speak Persian?
By Kaveh AkbarSome days we can see Venus in mid-afternoon. Then at night, stars
separated by billions of miles, light travelling years
to die in the back of an eye.
Search Results
YOU ARE WHO I LOVE
By Aracelis GirmayYou, selling roses out of a silver grocery cart
You, in the park, feeding the pigeons
You cheering for the bees
You with cats in your voice in the morning, feeding cats
Declaration of Inter-Dependence
By Richard BlancoSuch has been the patient sufferance...
We're a mother's bread, instant potatoes, milk at checkout line; her three children pleading for bubble gum and their father. We're the three minutes she steals to page a tabloid, needing to believe even stars' lives are as joyful and bruised.
There Is a Lake Here
By Clint SmithThere is a lake here.
A lake the size of
outstretched arms. And no,
not the type of arms raised
I Don’t Know Any Longer Why the Flags Are At Half-Staff
By Hanif Willis-AbdurraqibI think I am breaking up with memory. again. I live
by only that which will still allow me
to do the living. The flag, for example, reminds me
to either feel fear or sadness, depending on how high
The Love for My Culture
By Elexia AlleyneMaybe it’s the Spanish running through my veins
That’s the only way I know how to explain it
Maybe it’s the r’s rrrolling off my tongue
See,
america
By Fatimah Asgharam I not your baby?
brown & not allowed
my own language?
my teeth pulled
A Small Needful Fact
By Ross GayIs that Eric Garner worked
for some time for the Parks and Rec.
Horticultural Department, which means,
perhaps, that with his very large hands,
not an elegy for Mike Brown
By Danez SmithI am sick of writing this poem
but bring the boy. his new name
his same old body. ordinary, black
dead thing. bring him & we will mourn
Guidelines
By Lisa Suhair MajajIf they ask you what you are,
say Arab. If they flinch, don't react,
just remember your great-aunt's eyes.