William Carlos Williams famously wrote, “It is difficult / to get the news from poems / yet men die miserably every day / for lack / of what is found there.” As I choose a poem each week for the box, I consider where poetry intersects with the news, where the concerns of the immediate moment meet the perpetual concerns of the human condition.
A verdict may come this week in the trial of the police officer who killed George Floyd with a knee to his neck. More black men have been killed by police since the trial began. Demonstrators against policy brutality take to the streets across the country. There remains so much work to be done. And there is this tender and devastating poem by Ross Gay to offer as reminder.
“...like making it easier
for us to breathe”
