Belt Magazine

04/14/2025

“I now own four of his paintings, but this kind of stuffy collector language feels silly to use. People at his shows are always smiling, because it’s impossible to be art-gallery-serious around this work.”

Margaret Grebowicz on the work of Buffalo painter Robert Harris.

https://beltmag.com/robert-harris-buffalo-artist

I now own four of his paintings, but this kind of stuffy collector language feels silly to use. People at his shows are always smiling, because it’s impossible to be art-gallery-serious around this work.

04/07/2025

“Lucy’s is not a white savior story. It’s a complex story about Black emancipation and white allyship, and how in the fight for justice and equity, the best of intentions is absolutely necessary, but often not enough. It’s about how history calls us to follow in their footsteps, but also find ways to do better.”

Paul Sturtevant on the forgotten history of Lucy Martindale.

Lucy’s is not a white savior story. It’s a complex story about Black emancipation and white allyship, and how in the fight for justice and equity, the best of intentions is absolutely necessary, but often not enough. It’s about how history calls us to follow in their footsteps, but also find w...

04/01/2025

I’m suddenly ablaze in light. All my worry has come down to the decision of compassionate, reasonable human beings. I would hug these medical heroes, including the hospice nurse, if they were present — virus be damned.

04/01/2025

It’s — no foolin’! We publish new poetry from authors in our region each week, with our archive always freely available.

Poetry

03/27/2025

Recovering Alice Dunbar-Nelson: an underrated writer and survivor tied to a controversial Dayton great. By Janyce Denise Glasper.

an Underrated Writer and Survivor Tied to a Controversial Dayton Great.

03/24/2025

“I’m suddenly ablaze in light. All my worry has come down to the decision of compassionate, reasonable human beings. I would hug these medical heroes, including the hospice nurse, if they were present — virus be damned.”

Read “Going Gently” by Ed Davis, an excerpt from HINDSIGHT: UNTOLD STORIES FROM 2020, by Steve Fowler.

I’m suddenly ablaze in light. All my worry has come down to the decision of compassionate, reasonable human beings. I would hug these medical heroes, including the hospice nurse, if they were present — virus be damned.

03/21/2025

“My dad describes
his childhood drives
across the Detroit border
as if he were Dorothy
entering Oz…”

A new poem by A. J. Frantz.

https://beltmag.com/alter

A poem by A.J. Frantz.

03/20/2025

“Jakiela is a master of an essay form that is distinctly her own, a kind of integrated collage style that brings together her background as a journalist and the author of collections of poetry, weaving together quotes, facts, musings, digressions, and stories.”

Nancy Grace McCabe reviews ALL SKATE, the new book by Lori Jakiela.

Jakiela is a master of an essay form that is distinctly her own, a kind of integrated collage style that brings together her background as a journalist and the author of collections of poetry, weaving together quotes, facts, musings, digressions, and stories.

03/17/2025

I stayed in Ireland for two weeks, a visitor, a tourist. Everywhere Sinead and I would go, we’d play a game Sinead invented called “Spot the American.”

Read “Of the Wolf,” an excerpt from ALL SKATE: TRUE STORIES FROM MIDDLE LIFE by Lori Jakiela and released by Roadside Press.

I stayed in Ireland for two weeks, a visitor, a tourist. Everywhere Sinead and I would go, we’d play a game Sinead invented called “Spot the American.”

03/14/2025

“Sepia murals of workers coat the walls—
smelters, farmers, such drudgery.”

Read “Woman Singing in the Post Office,” a new poem by Cleveland writer Cathy Barber.

A poem by Cathy Barber.

03/04/2025

Need some spring break reading? Rep your region with a copy of DISPATCHES FROM THE RUST BELT, our annual print anthology of the most-read stories from the site. All purchases help support our mission of continuing to bring the voices of our region to a broader audience.

For almost a decade, Belt Magazine has published reporting and essays that are of the Rust Belt, by the Rust Belt, and for the Rust Belt. In a year that saw the continuing coronavirus pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the midterm elections, and the growing devastations of climate change, Belt has been t

02/27/2025

"'Ohio' wasn’t a derogatory term when I was in middle school. But nearby Cleveland, where I experienced horizon-expanding art, culture, and cannoli, was often referred to as 'the Mistake on the Lake.' The nickname stung. It also imprinted on me a fierce loyalty and an even fiercer desire to rename the beleaguered home I left at nineteen. Perhaps I had no other choice but to become a writer."

Rebecca Moon Ruark reviews COLLEGIATE GOTHIC (2024) by Matthew Meduri, out now from Bordighera Press.

"Collegiate Gothic" Skewers Academia (and Ohio) in Fine Form

02/24/2025

“Instead, my long-held distaste for RFK Jr. and his antivaccine furor boils down to a far more basic impasse: You simply cannot make me see my brother as broken.” -- Julia Shiota

Instead, my long-held distaste for RFK Jr. and his antivaccine furor boils down to a far more basic impasse: You simply cannot make me see my brother as broken.

02/20/2025

“The Juggalo identity and the internet emerged in tandem as secularism gave way to pop cultural spirituality.”

Read an excerpt from 1999: THE YEAR LOW CULTURE CONQUERED AMERICA AND KICKSTARTED OUR BIZARRE TIMES by Ross Benes, out now from the University Press of Kansas.

The Juggalo identity and the internet emerged in tandem as secularism gave way to pop cultural spirituality.

02/10/2025

"Unexpected guidance came in the form of a job with yet another Detroit legend, James Osterberg, who if you know anything about rock music, you recognize as Iggy Pop."

A tale of rock ‘n roll guidance from Michael Zadoorian.

Unexpected guidance came in the form of a job with yet another Detroit legend, James Osterberg, who if you know anything about rock music, you recognize as Iggy Pop.

02/07/2025

“As a child in the
hometown lake, I would dive to feel the rocks at
the bottom, lining them up on the shore before
they became dull in the sun.”

A Poem by grace (ge) gilbert.

A poem by Grace Gilbert.

02/06/2025

“If we are going to care about the environment and preserve natural spaces in the so-called ‘rust belt,’ then we must love rust. We must practice terranexus and accept and even love the chaotic intersection of civilized and natural worlds.”

Read “Terranexus in the Rust Belt” by Eric D. Lehman.

If we are going to care about the environment and preserve natural spaces in the so-called “rust belt,” then we must love rust. We must practice terranexus and accept and even love the chaotic intersection of civilized and natural worlds.