Using your voice is a political choice

Every poet should ask themselves these two questions:

1. Whose shoulders do you stand on?
2. What do you stand for?

Public speaking can feel terrifying. One way to find the strength to speak up is to think of people whose shoulders you can stand on. From this height, we have the sight to see the power of poetry, of expressible language.

Poetry is a language of bridges, not barriers. And this power of connection makes it political.

There are three ways in which the decision to create and have a voice is a political act:

• The stories we tell. When, where, and how we're telling our stories says a lot about the political beliefs we hold.
• Who gets to have their stories told. The person who tells the stories says a lot about the political and educational systems in which these stories and storytellers exist.
• Poetry is focused on people. In history, tyrants often go after the creatives and books first.