Whit Press

01/05/2026

This will be a good one! Arthur and Mandana both wonderful!

Join us on Thursday, January 15, 2026 at 7 pm ET/4 pm PT for a special conversation about poetry in translation with Arthur Sze, the 25th Poet Laureate of the United States, led by Mandana Chaffa, Vice President of the Barrios Book in Translation Prize.

Arthur Sze is the twenty-fifth Poet Laureate of the United States and a celebrated editor and translator. He has authored twelve collections of poetry, most recently Into the Hush (2025); The Glass Constellation (2021), winner of the 2024 National Book Foundation Science + Literature Prize; and Sight Lines (2019), recipient of the National Book Award. Further honors include the Bollingen Prize for Lifetime Achievement for American Poetry, a Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, and the Shelley Memorial Award. Sze lives with his wife, the poet Carol Moldaw, in Santa Fe, where he served as the city’s first poet laureate.

On Zoom, free with pre-registration: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_lyoImaPBQv-TsZ5IrL5XMQ

12/28/2025

"What the Living Do When Ceasefire is Announced."
Poem by
Art: _Perseverance_ by

https://baladimagazine.com/what-the-living-do-when-ceasefire-is-announced/

12/14/2025

12/11/2025

Ready to Read

Stay tuned… Our highly anticipated longlists come out next week!

12/06/2025

12/02/2025

Assuring a place for our poets and storytellers to learn, develop, and publish their work is at root an act of hope. It is grounded in the certainty that the written word transcends barriers of culture, race, and class, and intimately connects us to one another’s lives–as individuals, as communities, and as a nation.

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I hope Whit Press will be part of your year end giving. As a small organization, your support means so much. With Gratitude and Respect for you all, thank you. Link below

Assuring a place for our poets and storytellers to publish their work is at root an act of hope. It is grounded in the certainty that the written word transcends barriers of culture, race, and class, and intimately connects us to one another’s lives–as individuals, as communities, and as a natio...

11/24/2025

24 Gazans killed; Israeli settlers poison sheep, boast about their terrorism; land theft in W Bank; US campuses treat anti-genocide protesters like terrorists

11/24/2025

Egyptian-Canadian author Omar El Akkad’s book One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This has received the National Book Awards in the US.

El Akkad’s first work of non-fiction was written after the Gaza war began and accuses the West of complicity in the Palestinian enclave’s destruction.

The title of the book reflects how moral stances easily shift once violence has passed. El Akkad reflects upon these topics as he also recounts his own upbringing across Egypt, Qatar and Canada.

The book was among five titles that competed in the non-fiction category of the annual US awards.

11/05/2025

Here is the third of four reliefs located in the U.S. Capitol rotunda. It is titled “The Rescue of Captain John Smith by Pocahontas.” It was sculpted by Antonio Capellano in 1825.

This relief reflects how early America used art to justify conquest and comfort itself with myths of friendship and forgiveness. It is part of the fictitious American origin story.

For two centuries, this story, retold in books, classrooms, and a Disney cartoon, has been celebrated as a moment of friendship and peace. It is pure fiction.

John Smith didn’t mention this supposed “rescue” until seventeen years after it supposedly happened, long after he’d returned to England and needed to rebuild his reputation. By then, he had learned that a story of a beautiful “Indian princess” saving a brave Englishman sold well to readers eager for tales of adventure and divine destiny.

Meanwhile, the real Pocahontas, whose name was Matoaka, was kidnapped by English colonists and held hostage to force her father, Chief Powhatan, into submission. Although her people met most of the English demands, she was never released.

During captivity she was converted to Christianity, renamed Rebecca, and married John Rolfe. Taken to England as a trophy, Pocahontas died in 1617 at the age of 21. She was buried in Gravesend, England.

The Capitol relief portrays a child as a woman, a hostage as a heroine, and conquest as divine fate.

Matoaka, aka Pocahontas, deserves better. We all deserve better.