Ten poetry books that illuminate a decade’s struggles
Occupy Wall Street. The Peoples Climate March. The Women’s March. Black Lives Matter. The ongoing mobilizations to defeat Trump and the extreme right that supports him.
As we marched and organized against injustice, poets, often marching right alongside us, were creating enduring works of literary art that spoke to the struggle and the times we live in.
As a new generation took to the streets between 2010-19, poetry increased in popularity, whether reading poetry of social consciousness in traditional forms, or through hiphop rhymes and rhythms, going viral on social media.
We know that people have always turned to the intimate voices of poetry to speak to the complex times they live in, and to open up new worlds. One particular reason now may be the increased access to a range of new voices—Black, Latinx, Asian, Indigenous, women, LGBTQ, etc.—opened up by social media, both nationally and globally.
What follows is not a “best of” the incredible diversity of poetry published in the decade 2010-19 in the U.S. (let alone worldwide)—although many of these poems could claim that mantle—but a selected list of ten important poetry books written from, about or for the movement for social justice.
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Ten poetry books that illuminate a decade’s struggles
Source: peoplesworld.org
