All stories
Erasure I and Erasure VI
In two erasure poems, a poet-anthropologist imagines alternative futures using text from the 1846 Treaty of Amritsar, through which the British “sold” Kashmir to a despotic Dogra ruler. The poems are from a six-part series titled Song of the First Spring.
Tallahassee Ghazal
Using an ancient Arabic poetic form, a poet-archaeologist from Florida cycles through feelings of entrapment growing up queer in the U.S. South. But in the end, they celebrate love for this place—and that “most of us are breathing.”
Debitage
Using an original poetic form, a poet chips away at a difficult history—becoming an agent of her own remaking and more than just an estranged daughter.
Broken Sonnets for the Anthropocene
The speaker in this broken sonnet form utters disobedience for structures that extract care in the Anthropocene.
Pequi Winds
A poet-anthropologist reflects on the resistance of rural women in the Brazilian Cerrado whose wisdom and knowledge help cultivate life amid the devastation of large-scale plantations.
Emic/Etic
A poet-anthropologist offers an “anti-glossary” to contest ways of knowing in social science that objectify people(s) into categories.
Passing Notes
The speaker of a poem refuses linguistic erasure, passing secret notes with untranslated lines in Korean—keeping the language alive during Japanese occupation.
Heaven on Earth and Jesus Is Palestinian
A poet calls readers to act in the face of interconnected violence, exploitation, and privilege.
An Order for My Backpack and Three Stages of Nowhere
A poet moves through rituals of silence and erasure that permeate the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
El orden de mi mochila y Tres etapas para nada
Un poeta recorre rituales de silencio y omisión que permean la prisión militar estadounidense en la Bahía de Guantánamo, Cuba.
Translation Notes
A translator’s notes are refashioned into a poem calling for justice for Indigenous peoples in the Philippines displaced by a megadam.
Poets Resist, Refuse, and Find a Way Through
In a themed collection, poets trace contours of power to critique colonialism, environmental destruction, and social violence while transforming the landscape of possibilities.
Survival Notes
Black African women in former colonial centers such as London gesture to subversive ways of communicating with those imprisoned in archives across generations.
An Imagined Monograph for Nongqawuse
A 19th-century prophetess reportedly bore a serious message from the ancestors to her Xhosa people amid British colonial assault. The written archives judged her—but much still remains unknown and unacknowledged.
Her Dirge
A poet-historian reflects on women’s labor carrying memories and the past.
Harvest Song
A poet-anthropologist celebrates relatedness across difference in a poem that honors the festivals of Navratri, Durga Puja, Kali Puja, Day of the Dead, and Halloween—all of which draw on otherworldly connections and mysteries.
