10 Search results for "calamity"

A Difficult Miracle: Black Poetics in a Time of Crisis  By Jari Bradley  Prior to the Callaloo Creative Writing Workshop, I had never been to a writer’s retreat or a poetry workshop, period. The year was 2015, a year at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement, a time when the entire country felt […]

by Jari Bradley During the peak of the pandemic in 2020, there were numerous online poetry readings being held for the public to attend. I was just finishing my Master of Fine Arts program after three years on the East Coast, and with all the calamity that the world felt comprised of at that time, […]

by Donnie Moreland As a boy, I remember learning about firefighters. I found their work as spectacular as the graphic novels, and Saturday morning superheroes, which crowded my daydreams. There was no difference between the cape and their fire helmet. And there were enough Black men, dawning the garb and colors of the local fire […]

by Donnie Moreland There is a whispered binding between Black folks and the truth. Less truth, in that meta-ethical way we discern the spiritually evidential as Black folks, but truth telling. The expressions, negotiations and altercations with, and of, “facts.” How we tell the truth, digest it and confirm that truth as just that; gospel.  […]

This essay contains descriptions of racial violence and spoilers for Episode 6 of HBO’s Watchmen  by Donnie Moreland I don’t trust Damon Lindelhoff—the showrunner of HBO’s Watchmen. He’s a damn compelling writer, but he is one that often conflates philosophical inquiry with good storytelling, which can result in pretentiously puzzling television; of which I’m very […]

by Donnie Moreland  This essay mentions domestic violence.  August Wilson once noted, “The blues are important primarily because they contain the cultural expression and the cultural response to blacks in America and to the situation that they find themselves in.” I believe this to be true, in so far as the Blues may no longer […]

It is true that “all the girls wanna play Baywatch” at the swimming pools full of liquor (Kendrick Lamar, “Swimming Pools”). Generation Y parties, both in college and high school, present you with a reality surfacing from the deep end of young adult freedom. Diving through the future, our new understandings of suffering blend with […]

The OCCUPY WALL STREET Movement Is Heating UP! Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but there are huge protests going on in NYC. Aiming for worldwide participation, Occupy Wall Street has attracted hostile media attention, outright police violence, and support from celebrities like Susan Sarandon and Michael Moore. The movement is in its 12th day, and it’s […]

Sharpton: Obama, Congress must act on failing education to stop a national crisis of black and white Rev. Al Sharpton, NY Post | November 12, 2010 On the heels of President Obama’s self-professed “shellacking,” a renewed urgency for bipartisanship has emerged in Washington. One week later, a new study proves that the education gap between […]

Competition is inherent in politics. In our fast paced digital age we have shunned in- depth exposés for quick tweets about who is up and who is down. The talking heads elites in media and punditry use political sabermetrics to compare approval ratings at various times in presidential administrations. These politicos mainly use their heaps […]