Calling poets to a greater role in public life and fostering a national network of socially engaged poets.
By Kyle DarganNaturally, the gun is purchased from a farm in Virginia—pulled from a bushel of barrels
by a tremorous hand, a young man’s. His other fist proffers sweat-wilted dollars. The
farmer, compensated, keeps his gaze down as to remember nothing of the boy’s face.
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,
By Lauren K. AlleyneJust like that the day is black
and blue, bruised with hate.
Just like that my skin, black
as fine leather stretches so tight
By Heidi Andrea Restrepo RhodesWake. Wake.
These the nights we sing. These the folds,
unborn reverie, ambition marbled mud & shine,
raging anthem born like diamonds out darkest ash & rain
By Mahogany L. Browne& then the poet became G_D/like
just’a rolling his tongue everywhere
like G O D must’ve
when the earth got birth(ed) & even
By Rebecca BlackSergio has ink-pot eyes, girlish wrists.
He draws superheroes extremely well—
Avengers, Wolfman, El Toro Rojo,
By Hari Allurithe tea in her glass. It glows the brocade.
Her grandmother picked that tea
on a mountain—a mountain in a war
whose shores were her bed. Steeping, the petals
By Vincent ToroA lung lit like diesel
is not fable or fodder.
Is not sewage siphoned from stern
and starboard. Cuffs, not slapdash plums
plunge from your garden
By Carlos Andrés GómezCarlos Andrés Gómez performs the poem " 'Juan Valdez' (or 'Why is a white guy like you named 'Carlos'?')" at the 2012 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.
By Alice WalkerAlice Walker performs the poem "Every Revolution Needs Fresh Poems" at the 2012 Split This Rock Poetry Festival.