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EHRP Poetry in Current Affairs: Lunar New Year & Snake Year

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Co-published by Economic Hardship Reporting Project and Current Affairs.

LUNAR NEW YEAR
By Celina Su

This year signifies transformation,
as if we could molt away
old skins and transform them
into expensive clutches,
into cold-blooded.

Closed off streets are, to
pedestrians, open streets.
Every inclusion another’s exclusion.

A student, plaintive: “I’m a Black male
who voted for Trump. Is that the colonizer
mentality in me?”

I can t use three letters: D, E, or I.
Will my research be shut down
or embrace Chinese netizens’ euphemisms
“youth in Asia” equals euthanasia.
Damn, you crazy, every time
I mean democracy.

Fight, flight, freeze, and fawn.
Also gather?
Deer are not evil.
They attack when hurt.

These long winter nights.
Let’s write shorter lines.


SNAKE YEAR
By Alissa Quart

Democrats have no idea how to
respond. That’s a headline,
not a joke. News cycle,
news cyclone. Ouroboros.

Our dogs look out windows, aged
women in the old country.
The most elegant bridges connect
the least glamorous nabes (Verrazzano).
Pocketbook voters; price of eggs.

One friend dubs another
“a trauma unit.” FOMO
also an animal sentiment.

Those “who vote on inflation” appear
in news’ photos, packed in
steamy delis. The cliché:
you’re counted or you’re discounted.

Ophidian American fascist calls
his method “muzzle velocity.”
An Iranian film made in secret, against
the regime, a forced indoors
aesthetic, as in my current
mood: I don’t want to
leave my apartment.

Price of eggs. Ouroboros.

We are running out of money.
The rich running

for cover. This really is
the year of the snake

Authors

  • Celina Su

    Celina Su was born in São Paulo, Brazil, and lives in Brooklyn. Her first book of poetry, Landia, was published by Belladonna* in 2018. Her writing includes two poetry chapbooks, three books on the politics of social policy and civil society, and pieces in journals such as n+1, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, and elsewhere. Su is the Marilyn J. Gittell Chair in Urban Studies and a Professor of Political Science at the City University of New York.

  • Alissa Quart

    Alissa Quart is the author of five books of nonfiction including the acclaimed Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream, now out in paperback, Squeezed: Why Our Families Can't Afford America and Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers. She built the non-profit the Economic Hardship Reporting Project with the late Barbara Ehrenreich: she has run it for close to a decade. She is also the author of two books of poetry Monetized and Thoughts and Prayers, and has written for many publications including The New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post and TIME. She has produced films and the show “Going for Broke,” centering on EHRP’s lower income contributors. Her awards include an Emmy, an SPJ Award, a Columbia Journalism School Alumna of the Year Award, a Nieman Fellowship, and a National Press Club commendation. She lives with her family in Brooklyn.

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Celina Su was born in São Paulo, Brazil, and lives in Brooklyn. Her first book of poetry, Landia, was published by Belladonna* in 2018. Her writing includes two poetry chapbooks, three books on the politics of social policy and civil society, and pieces in journals such as n+1, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, and elsewhere. Su is the Marilyn J. Gittell Chair in Urban Studies and a Professor of Political Science at the City University of New York.

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