Tag Archives: Poetry

Arts & Culture

POETRY: (S)Weep Us

by Art Gomez and Melanie Reed

Nowhere to go but another hole,
another alley, another pole,
another spread, another pitch,
just more dirty sons a bitch
caught in a sweep to push us out
some show sympathy, some sow doubt.
Exterminate this Shantytown,
lives dismantled, tents torn down,
ground impounded, trash swept clean
it’s as if we’ve never been.
We’re so easy to revile,
the Jungle is our domicile.
No Favala, no Hooverville.
Home is where

the heart beats still.

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Arts & Culture

POETRY: FREE

by Nakeya Isabell

Many people talk about the struggle

But I wonder if they know the story of pain

How our ancestors journeyed through the terror and the rain

See Harriet Tubman said she freed a thousands slaves

But could have freed a 1,000 more if only they knew they were slaves………

See, If we knew we were trained to be modern-day slaves, would we really choose to live?

What would happen if we acknowledged our reality and made steps towards change?

If we as people could recognize our identity, with a propensity to embrace our strengths, we could change this world

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Arts & Culture

Does This Poem Bring You Joy? A Conversation With Arianne True

by Beverly Aarons

Does this poem bring you joy? Does it move through and speak to your body? Does it make you think and feel something deeply? Arianne True, a Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations poet and experiential educator, has important questions for all poets, both young and old, but especially for the middle-school students at Hugo House’s Scribes summer writing camp. How can the experience of poetry shape how you see yourself and history?

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Arts & Culture

POETRY: The streets are crying.

by Cecilia Erin Walsh 

daily burials without memorial. selective testing. 
arrogance and stupidity passing for leadership.
seclusion. isolation. hunger. masks on every face. 
furtive movements across the city. essential travel only. 
certain scarcity. overcrowded hospitals. 
layoffs. domestic violence and suicide rise. 
mental health crisis phone lines ring incessantly. 

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Arts & Culture, Poetry

POETRY: Power

by Kayla Blau

There is nothing powerful about trespassing for 400-odd years

But here we are,

Writing words on mistreated trees and calling them true

Tagging broad stripes and bright stars on purloined fabric

Directing lives, fancying ourselves unsung heroes,

Victorious sinners,

Bruised egos and bellies full of shame.

There is nothing brave here.

Include in us our pasts –

Which of course, include your pasts too,

All of them lined up like precarious dominoes

Leading you right here,

Leading me right here,

Leading us to believe whatever truths we can stomach

To absolve ourselves of the truest truth –

“Es completamente injusto,”

The mother told me.

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Arts & Culture, Poetry

POETRY: Persephonic Poetry Numbers 3, 8 and 16

by Neve Kamilah Mazique-Bianco

three

I never played violin

but I did feel the bow run over my strings.

Plucked from the air, gravity claimed me

for the earth. Now

whenever the music plays,

my veins light up.

My nerves dance. 

My chest sprouts wings.

Celestial, though I’m feared.

eight

viruses have always been clever, 

transmittable, and people do get cleverer

with time sure but what about the people

we lose right now. I don’t know what to do

with my body. I’m writing. I’m riding this wave

here. Here.

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Arts & Culture, Poetry

Poetry: Stay Places

by Minnie A. Collins 

Stay Places

On kitchen window ledge

Eyes flicked; feathers flapped

In flights from red holly, evergreen cone seeds

Back to a sun-drenched rain sheltered sanctum

Of twigs, hair, bark, yarn, string, lichen,  

An annual ritual against covert predators;  

Without warning, wind gusts

Swirled needles, mud flecks, strings 

Once woven with time, love, immunity

Toppling the sheltered sanctum;

Flight wings, forlorn, futile 

Fluttered against the pane

Screeching as feet ensnared the screen;  

I took time to stare, to move closer to the pane

To find the scattered refuge

To understand our kindred nature:

Compassion, immunity, empathy and pain

Hopefully never alone!

Returning to the ledge, weary yet impatient

Twists, loops, mud, gird our shelters,  

Defying vulnerable agitations 

Circumventing catastrophes

Repositioning common places 

To stay places that you and I name.

Minnie A. Collins is a South Seattle poet, writer, and all-around amazing human being.

Featured image: by Stephen L. Harlow.