for Carl Sandburg We learned “Fog” in English Class and how it moved on little cat feet, a tenderness crept across me then touching a place I could not name. When our teacher recited “Chicago” The Big Shoulders of that city held me lifting me up above Piedmont, South Carolina allowing me to see the […]
My mama is magic. Always was and always will be. There is one phrase that constantly bubbled from the lips of her five children, “My momma can do it.” We thought my mama knew everything. Believed she did, as if she were born full grown from the Encyclopedia of Britannica. I could tell you stories […]
After Sean Hill From my lips I stitch a quilt, a crooked song that weaves its way around South Carolina, a pie shape that conjures food — ice tinkling in glasses of amber tea or heat rising off rich red velvet cake layers too sweet like the words I was raised on, words that say, […]
For Middlesex County Academy in New Brunswick, NJ — Alternative School and Damon House — Alcohol & Drug Treatment Facility They banter back and forth like boys do: You charcoal, son. You so black you purple. I tell them, hol’up in defense of my mahogany skin and the boy they’re putting down. I say, You know what they […]
I am sure this is the beginning of a poem. Everything in my life seems to be. When my predominantly black class did not know who Maya Angelou was this week, it broke my heart, but not enough for me to not use it as a teachable moment. I wore my Maya Angelou shirt the […]
Poet-in-Residence, Peace Voices
101 W. Broad Street
Greenville, SC 29601
Phone: 864-679-9212
Email: gredmond@peacecenter.org