Moral Imperfections
Evolution
You love me so much
lifetime lifeline
lost my way
Disappear daily
Guilt fear cling climb
My voice abandoned
Do not recognize
mirror image
l miss me and you
let’s take our love with us.
Ark of Return*
Legacy of slavery
Stings stains shadows
Sorrow weeps tears gush
Muffle chorus of screams
Their lives death sentence
Ancestral truth lifts veil
My heart breaks heals
My breath stops starts
In Solemn space
Spread our wings
Fly soar
Return.
*United Nations permanent marble memorial/New York City, 2015
Burn this Place Down
Pain layered inside bone
stick to skin
rides bare back
memories crochet
blood stained words
silence still born
stayed together
secrets sleep
chose death
born under stairs
candle light flickers
dot darkness
burn this house down
ancestors’ voices call out
gut everything
ask for forgiveness
chance for reckoning
raise head eyes
scorched earth
turns inside out
ashes grow wings
mayday mayday
possibilities kneel
Pray.
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"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive."
~ James Baldwin
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Contests & Prizes
Flash Fiction Contest
On May 1st, we announced the winners of our Flash Fiction Contest: Thomas Garcia (1st), Rick Krizman (2nd), and Rios de la Luz (3rd). Read more.
The James Baldwin Literature Prize
It is with great pleasure that we announce the winner of The James Baldwin Literature Prize of $1,000 to Hafsa Musa. Read more.
Recent Literature
"As an Act of Protest" Exposes the Frauds, Hypocrites, and Cowards
Wonderland, A Collection
The Arrested Evolution of William S. Burroughs
Dr. Strangetimes or: How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Virus
The Writer
Futures in Gold
The Wanting Was a Wilderness
There’s Something About (Intergenerational) Trauma
La Dona Remedia
Hanging in The Balance
The End of Imagination
Grass Waving Under Wind, A Collection
The New Engagement
The New Engagement endeavors a novel approach to discovering, introducing, and showcasing writers, artists, and filmmakers, by providing them digital and print platforms, while encouraging and supporting their social-consciousness.