Poets & Writers Magazine welcomes feedback from its readers. Please post a comment on select articles at pw.org, e-mail editor@pw.org, or write to Editor, Poets & Writers Magazine, 90 Broad Street, Suite 2100, New York, NY 10004. Letters accepted for publication may be edited for clarity and length.
Letters
Feedback from readers
I wish to thank you, profoundly, for featuring Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha in your November/December 2024 issue. As an activist for Palestine since 2003, and a loyal fan of Abu Toha’s work, I actually gasped aloud when I received my issue in the mail today. When I opened [to] the article, tears instantly came to my eyes, and they only grew heavier as I read on. It’s always been an act of bravery for a publication to stand with the oppressed, especially in a time when most are afraid to do so. We constantly see Palestine suppressed by the media, with major news on Gaza hidden or badly distorted, so this article comes as a beacon of hope that the plight of Palestine, which Abu Toha so perfectly relates to the history of Indigenous Americans and Black Americans, is beginning to reach past the barriers of censorship, racism, and political oppression. The watermelon seeds have sprouted, and new fruit is on its way. Thank you for bringing these tears to my eyes.
Stella Í. Rothe
Detroit, Michigan
Thank you for giving Mosab Abu Toha the cover of the November/December 2024 issue. I am a non-Zionist Jewish author, and I support you and any media outlets that lift Palestinian voices. I know there are many Zionists attacking people of conscience right now, so I just want to make sure you know there are Jews who support the cause of Palestine and who are grateful for those organizations willing to do right by [one of] the most oppressed communities in the world. The world should be talking about nothing but this right now, as by the hour more innocent lives are lost to this ongoing colonial genocide. Palestinians should be on the cover of every magazine until the outcry is strong enough to stop this unbearable occupation.
Page Getz
Vancouver, British Columbia
I’m writing from a place of pain and sorrow now. Will it make my writing better? No luck yet, but then I’ve not started promoting these words dragged from the lower depths. From this vantage point, I could really dig Sandra Beasley’s trying to pour from an empty cup (“Trying to Pour From an Empty Cup: Lessons in Learning to Say No,” November/December 2024). How life can change from yes to no. I recently dumped my last volunteer position, when there was nothing left to give. And I understand that hurt doesn’t always lead to wisdom. I’ve been a writer all my life, but suddenly it’s write or die. There’s nothing else left. How do others write from pain is a question I continually ask now, as I write a romance novel dragged from the trenches of who I once was. Keep sharing emotive lives here. They are so worth reading.
Monette Bebow-Reinhard
Madison, Wisconsin
[Corrections]
Due to incorrect information provided by the sponsoring organization, the deadline for the Treehouse Climate Action Poem Prize, sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, was incorrect in Deadlines (September/October 2024). The corresponding listing in the Writing Contests database at pw.org was updated to the correct deadline of November 1. The expanded online version of “Regina Brooks Leads the AALA” by Katie Arnold-Ratliff (November/December 2024) inaccurately capitalized jessica Care moore’s name, misspelled the name of moore’s press, Moore Black Press, and misidentified the first book published by the new imprint of Amistad; it is Every Where Alien by Brad Walrond.