From the Archives: 10 Banned Writers You Must Read

In recognition of Banned Books Week, Sampsonia Way presents a selection of exclusive interviews, excerpts, and profiles of the banned writers who have appeared in our pages – from imprisoned Chinese activists to American poets.

Show Me How to Trace This

by Kara Knickerbocker

& if you had a map out of your body, where would it go?
What is the point of exit you’d choose to leave yourself?

I’d choose the wounds already claimed:
the fried egg-shaped scar burned above my left knee,

Between Ordinary

By Meg Booth

I see you as
Light resting on a brick wall,
Pieces of the sky in

Between

A tangle of branches,
Stretched clouds on lazy days,
Dried tulip petals pressed

Between

Glass to preserve the spring.
An inhale before the notes escape.
The hum of a song stuck

Between

Douglas Ridloff at Play: The Poet Brings ASL Slam to the World

“Over time, I realized as I found my native language of expression, it led to poetry … and once I had that freedom in sign language, it led to so much more.” — Douglas Ridloff

Anniversary

by Jason Irwin All day I felt the need to call you, as if there was something important I should say. How to explain this restlessness, this feeling of being stranded when all around me the […]

A neighborhood cut down

by Frank G. Karioris

The smell of trees & nature holds the air steady
        juniper, maple, & pine.

Quiet is disrupted by mechanical whirs & hums
of machines digging ground outwards. …

A Morning Mambo with Bernstein and a Public Defender

by Lisa Brunner

Today on the morning commute, I decided that my soul could use a little Bernstein. Not decided. That’s too weak. Craved. The way I craved my coffee — a craving that doesn’t release until I burn my fingers on the mug. …

Earth Day 2020

“It is enough to mow prideful rows in the lawn three times a week/ and sincerely wish the mill still belched prosperity./ After all, decay was scraped from skyscraper-teeth by 1950.”