COVID, Isolation & Hope: Artists Respond to the Pandemic edited by Rafael Alvarado, Consuelo G. Flores and Richard Modiano

“This collection of poetry from during the Pandemic is healing. The humor heals. The insight. The dread. The hope. Poetry is good medicine right now.”

–Luis J. Rodriguez, Los Angeles Poet Laureate (2013-2016), author of From Our Land to Our Land: Essays, Journeys & Imaginings of a Native Xicanx Writer.

“A bulletin from the volatile waiting room that is 2020 to now, this anthology trembles with anxiety, anger, sorrow, and—at times—the most bitter pleasure. The writers / photographers assembled here jostle elbows and speak unmasked on pages that fold them into each other’s faces, homes, and grief. It’s a terrible grace that these artists cross such vast social distances to cut so close to the bone, that they set down to reckon with a time many can’t wait to forget.”

–Douglas Kearney

“From Wang Ping’s moving story of a doctor and a COVID patient in Wuhan, to Kim Dower’s plucky courage in the face of isolation, to the music of Amélie Frank’s pantoum, this anthology is full of candor, grace, insight, and good humor.  But mostly it is full of poetry, “the only form of speech we have that meets this need to acknowledge that we are more than unemployment statistics and death tolls” (Victor Infante).  What but poetry to help us come to terms with how extraordinary the ordinary things in our lives have become?  What but poetry to remind us that though we “shelter in space/like the stars” (Luis CuahtémocBerriozabal), “the baby still needs to be fed” (Aqueila M. Lewis-Ross).  Life, for the fortunate of us, has gone on, but this historical moment will be remembered always.  I am delighted that this anthology of COVID poems will be there to make sure it is remembered in all its beautiful humanity.”

–Gail Wronsky