A Message to Our Community

Poets House joins with all people of conscience to express outrage and pain as crisis grips our nation. George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, murdered, are just the most recent victims of systematic racism in our nation. Simultaneously this week, we acknowledge the dreadful threshold of 100,000 deaths from Covid-19 which, because of systemic inequity, inordinately impacts communities of color.

Over and over again racism expresses itself in lethal violence. Over and over again the survivors are told to wait for justice. Now is the time for all voices to be raised to demand our justice system be remade to be just.

What can poetry do in the face of these calamities—calamities not equally shared among us? Poets House acts on the belief that poetry bears witness, incites a language of mutuality and care, and by so doing insists on individual and collective action to bring about change. Poetry helps us find ways to stand in solidarity against brutality.

As the great Caribbean poet Édouard Glissant wrote, We cry our cry of poetry. Our boats are open and we sail them for everyone.

With love and solidarity,

Nicholas Potter, President
Linda Earle, Vice President
Lee Briccetti, Executive Director

The library is closed but we have many digital initiatives for our community.