Poems of Resistance, Power & Resilience – Courtney LeBlanc

As the incoming administration builds its agenda of attack on marginalized people, on freedom of speech, on the earth itself, poetry will continue to be an essential voice of resistance. Poets will speak out in solidarity, united against hatred, systemic oppression, and violence and for justice, beauty, and community.

In this spirit, Split This Rock is offering its blog as a Virtual Open Mic. For the rest of this frightening month, January of 2017, we invite you to send us poems of resistance, power, and resilience.

We will post every poem we receive unless it is offensive (containing language that is derogatory toward marginalized groups, that belittles, uses hurtful stereotypes, explicitly condones or implies a call for violence, etc.). After the Virtual Open Mic closes, we hope to print out and mail all of the poems to the White House.

For guidelines on how to submit poems for this call, visit the Call for Poems of Resistance, Power & Resilience blog post. 

***

I HAVEN’T BLED
by Courtney LeBlanc

in months – a mix

of medicine and years

of manic running.

When we lost the election

I yearned

for blood to rush from me

and purge

the seed of hope that had grown

inside. Instead

the only thing that flowed

were tears.

I went to work the next

day, eyes swollen,

tampons in my purse

for anyone who might

need them.