by Alexandra Gipson
“I grew up in Plum, a funny name for a funny town/ whose gaudy purple trash cans display the words/
“One Great Big Small Boro”/ with pride, as if this town has something to be proud of.”
The way in which Bryan Fogel portrays the complex constellations of power — from the press corps to the Saudi crown to the White House — reveals a clear story of how murky the issues of free speech and dissent can be. Though the events surrounding Khashoggi’s death are complicated, Fogel makes one thing definite: more must be done.
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Patrice Nganang describes his reading diet: “I read and stop, this book, that book, without distinction. Sometimes I read all the books of an author, and then move to other writers. I just finished reading the books by Cameroonian writer Max Lobe, and now it is Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor I am reading, after this I am reading Imbolo Mbue.”
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by Mike Schneider
Spend! Spend! Spend! Spend!
says the lady in billowing purple
& gold pajama pants & flip-flops,
shuffling east on Carson at 15th …
by Ellen McGrath Smith
“I have leased out my soul to these animals, no strings attached save their promise to keep being foxes, living on the fringe of the mess we’ve made, scoring petty carnage … ”
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by Michelle Fossum
“Last night I dreamt That Tom Hanks was my houseguest. His neighborly limbs were/Too long to fit comfortably within our walls,/ Having grown smaller somehow. Is it because of the quarantine,/
I thought, or was the house always this size?”
Last summer, Damon Young — the writer, critic, and humorist — partnered with City of Asylum to host a six-episode series called “How to Survive in America” in which he interviewed some of his favorite writers about writing, race, living through COVID-19, and everything in between.
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