Donations are being accepted for the reinstatement of the Richard Wright Library in Hinds County, MS, shut down for lack of funds and several times vandalized from 2020 onwards – a glass case with Richard Wright artifacts having been destroyed. If you want to make a donation however small, even the price of one pencil or ball pen, please write to imaginesisyphushappy26 @ gmail.com and you will be placed on a list of donors to be contacted once we have a support group and a fundraising link. If you cannot donate but have an idea about book-saving, please share.
RENOUNCING MAGIC
to Johanna Fernandez, one of the lessons she taught me …
when my childhood
had not yet
gone to seed
i loved magic
and princesses
and knights
on heroic steed
magic sleights of hand
magical thinking
were
the instant fix
that fast food
and fast thought
brought to my impatient hand
magic, magic, magic
was all
i could surf on
magic, magic, magic
at the reach
of a click
but when the time for magic
was gone
just like
in the Wizard of OZ
the curtain was swept aside
to reveal
a shrunken
predatory and imperialist old man
who was L. Frank Baum
i have found
in decades of retrospect
that the abolitionist struggle
is messy
and long
i have found
on the other side
of the illusionist’s mirror
that the abolitionist struggle
is not about magic
at all
it is about
feet in the mud
hands in the nitty gritty
eyes in the dark before dawn
it is about
loss upon loss
from which Hope
resurrects
each time stronger
but lovelorn
it is about accepting
that victory
is only here to stay
if we give up the myth
that some happenstance fairy
waved an individual wand –
no torch to pass on
it is about
realizing that the only magic
worthy of the name
is the Revolutionary Love
that burns
only because
we hold quiet vigil
and
we fuel its flame
collectively
steadfastly
in everyday robes
of threadbare
but weathered
Resistance
(c) Julia Wright August 7, 2026. All Rights Reserved to donations for memorializing Johanna Fernandez RIP.
GRASS-FED ON PAPER BOOKS
To my father who left the door of his library always open
i was brought up
free-range
grass-fed
on paper books
i was allowed
to graze freely
among delicious titles
of my own choice
the flesh
of my mind –
its very cells
became immune
to inhumanity
because reading
uncaged
was my daily diet
outside of the algorithms
and the thought prisons
of AI
the accretion
of ancestral booklore
in my being
is organic
and
that is why
i am capable of Love that is human
and
War that is a rite of passage
into the only world
worth fighting for
“(c) Julia Wright August 5, 2026. All Rights Reserved to donations for the reinstatement of the Richard Wright Library in Hinds County, MS, shut down for lack of funds and several times vandalized from 2020 onwards – a glass case with Richard Wright artifacts having been destroyed. If you want to make a donation however small, even the price of one pencil or ball pen, please write to imaginesisyphushappy26@gmail.com and you will be placed on a list of donors to be contacted once we have a support group and a fundraising link. If you cannot donate but have an idea about book-saving, please share”.
TO BE OR NOT TO BE ON THE BLACKLIST
the one of us
who first sent me
the Rubio Report
asked the right question:
why isn’t our name on the list,
what have we done
to be thus missed?
another one of us
said to me:
why bother with the Rubio report
after all
we were not attacked
so spending time over it
will not help us free Mumia
before i could say
i felt that
rather than name by name
the report targeted
our collective internationalism
presto
hours later
my father’s reputation was smeared
with vicious innuendo
so I am proud
and wear a badge of honor:
my father
and by extension
my family and I
must have done something right
to be so worthy of attack
that we appear
on the list of those
who are a thorn
in the side of fascism
i would not have it
otherwise
(c) Julia Wright August 9, 2026. All Rights Reserved.
LOVE NOT PHEAR AFTER THE FUNERAL
To little Valentina Fernandez, Johanna Fernandez’s niece
To Johanna Fernandez’s brothers with thanks for a Memorial that grounded us in Love not Phear
George Jackson
said before he was killed
that there would be
many funerals
and each candle-lit vigil
next to a dead warrior’s coffin
would awaken us
further to the Revolution’s burning task
to win
the live streamed memorial
of Johanna Fernandez
left us
internationally rekindled
but also humbled
to realize
that the Johanna each of us knew
was only a facet
of the warrior woman we lost
so iridescent
so vibrant
so present
that she lives collectively
in all our hearts
there will be more funerals
as we go from loss to loss
but each funeral lets us know
that the ancestors too
have held loving patient vigil
as we wake up
to a new mourning
and
there will be more children
joining the struggle
everyday
and each child
like Valentina
Johanna’ s little niece
will say
“Mama, I’m scared”
before venturing into
the deep end
of a glowing message
brim full of Love not Phear
(c) Julia Wright August 11, 2026. All Rights Reserved to donations for the September Memorial for Johanna Fernandez.
