These testimonials from professors, poets, novelists and activists are centered on last summer s protests against the police killings of Black people, but they tie connective threads between many countries and their crises Together this book is a maelstrom of grief, anger, fear and confusion, with glimmers of gratitude and hope: a comprehensive emotional document of a moment." Sebastian Modak,The New York Times
Angry, rueful, and defiant, the impressive roster of award-winning writers and academics portrays a nation wracked by pain . An eloquent and urgent collection. Kirkus, starred review
A potent and momentous in-the-moment response to an urgent and indelible time. Booklist
Written from the inner chambers of the heart, resonating with the questions that keep us up at night, and offering the recognition and generosity . This book is a promise, a solace, a sounding of our cries for justice and need for love. It s nothing short of essential. Garnette Cadogan, Literary Hub
Dynamic captures the remarkable nature of the last year. Karla Strand,Ms. Magazine
Revelatory collection of heartfelt reflections Forty treasured poets, scholars, and essayists document their experience of international racial reawakening and consider them alongside their survival of dueling pandemics, namely COVID-19 and systemic racism. Oprah Magazine, The Best Books to Pick Up This May
This powerful, riveting collection gives us the community we have longed for during the past year, the connection we have missed. It tells us the truth; it tells us what it is like. The Minneapolis Star Tribune
Preface by Tracy K. Smith
Patricia Smith, Salutation in Search Of Randall Kenan, Learning from the Ghosts of the Civil War Edwidge Danticat, Mourning Su Hwang, Why the Rebellion Had to Happen Here Michael Kleber-Diggs, On the Complex Flavors of Black Joy Amaud Jamaul Johnson, Letter from the Fault Lines of Midwestern Racism Layli Long Soldier, I Cannot Stop: A Response to the Murder of George Floyd Sofian Merabet, Be Safe Out There (And Other American Delusions, Rhetorical and Otherwise) Nyle Fort, I Hated That I Had to See Your Face Through Plexiglass Daniel Peña, Let These Protests Bring Light to America Claudia Castro Luna, Letter from a Seattle Protest Pitchaya Sudbanthad, Finding Justice in the Streets Indigo Moor, A Riotous Anodyne Tracy K. Smith, A Letter to Black America Joshua Bennett, Where Is Black Life Lived? Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, On the Endless Mourning of the Present Ali Black, On Protest, Laughter, and Finding Breath Gregory Pardlo, Letter to Juneteenth Major Jackson, Letter from Burlington James Noël, Black Prayer Dawn Lundy Martin, Sense Idrissa Simmonds-Nastili, Black Motherhood in Sleepless Times Cynthia Tucker, Letter to a Mother Who Survived and Thrived Jasmon Drain, Maybe (Letter to a Daughter Who Will Wear Two Masks) Camille T. Dungy, This ll Hurt Me More Ross Gay, Have I Ever Told You All the Courts I ve Loved Samiya Bashir, Letter from Exile: Finding Home in a Pandemic Héctor Tobar, A Generational Uprising Oscar Villalon, When the Shadow Is Looming Manuel Muñoz, From Plagues to Protests to Wildfires Craig Santos Perez, Postcards from a Quarantined Paradise Julia Alvarez, Past, Present, Yet to Come Nikky Finney, Letter to John Robert Lewis Reginald Dwayne Betts, Kamala Harris, Mass Incarceration, and Me Lilly Wachowski, Refuse Fascism, at the Ballot Box and in the Street Monica Youn, Why I m Getting Out of the Boiler Room This Election Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, Voting Trump Out Is Not Enough Francisco Goldman, The Fall of Trump: On Presidents, Dictators, and Life After a Regime Sasha LaPointe, Thunder Song Kirsten West Savali, On Motherhood and Ancestral Resistance
Contributor Bios
TRACY K. SMITH is the author of four books of poetry, including Life on Mars, winner of the Pulitzer Prize. Such Color: New and Selected Poems will be published in October. She is also the editor of an anthology, American Journal: Fifty Poems for Our Time, and cotranslator (with Changtai Bi) of My Name Will Grow Wide Like a Tree: Selected Poems by Yi Lei. Smith s memoir, Ordinary Light, was named a finalist for the National Book Award. From 2017 to 2019, Smith served two terms as the twenty-second Poet Laureate of the United States. She is currently a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.
JOHN FREEMAN is the founder of Freeman s, the literary annual of new writing, and executive editor at Alfred A. Knopf. The author of five books, including The Park and Dictionary of the Undoing, he has edited several other anthologies including Tales of Two Americas, a book about inequality in America, and Tales of Two Planets, which examines the climate crisis globally. He teaches at NYU.