In this week's episode of the Get Lit Minute, your weekly poetry podcast, we spotlight the life and work of American poet and spoken-word artist, Dr. Eve L. Ewing. She is a sociologist of education and a writer from Chicago. She is the author, most recently, of the poetry collection 1919 and the nonfiction work Ghosts in the Schoolyard: Racism and School Closings on Chicago's South Side. She is the co-author (with Nate Marshall) of the play No Blue Memories: The Life of Gwendolyn Brooks. She also currently writes the Champions series for Marvel Comics and previously wrote the acclaimed Ironheart series, as well as other projects. Her work has been published in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and many other venues. Source
This episode includes a reading of her poem, "I come from the fire city.", featured in our 2021 Get Lit Anthology.
"I come from the fire city."
i come from the fire city / fire came and licked up our houses,
lapped them up like they were nothing / drank them like the last
dribbling water from a concrete fountain / the spigot is too hot to
touch with your lips be careful / fire kissed us and laughed / and
even now the rust climbs the walls, red ivy / iron fire and the brick
blossoms florid / red like stolen lipstick ground down to a small
flat earth / stand on any corner of the fire city, look west to death
/ the red sun eats the bungalows / the fire city children watch
with their fingers in their mouths / to savor the flaming hots or
hot flamins or hot crunchy curls or hot chips / they open the fire
hydrants in the fire city and lay dollar store boats in the gutters /
warrior funeral pyres unlit