2020

Book excerpt: 2020 is a year we shall never forget-not America, not the world. The tragic death of Kobe Bryant and his daughter GiGi. The global pandemic called COVID-19. The police killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd. The massive street protests of Black Lives Matter. The passing of famous names like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Chadwick Boseman, Naya Rivera, and Congressman John Lewis. The U.S. presidential election and its ugly aftermath. Amidst all of this, acclaimed writer Kevin Powell and the historic Nuyorican Poets Cafe partnered on seven free Zoom writing workshops to allow people to express themselves in a safe and non-judgmental space, and to build community given the harsh realities of COVID. Writers of all ages and identities showed up. Seven workshops turned into ten workshops plus a permanent Facebook group of a few hundred writers. And now this book: 2020: THE YEAR THAT CHANGED AMERICA. Award-winning and game-changing writers like Nikki Giovanni, Gloria Steinem, Etan Thomas, Nancy Mercado, Dave Zirin, Jackson Katz, jessica Care moore, asha bandele, Tim Wise, Bob Holman, and V (formerly Eve Ensler) join both previously published and newly published writers of blogs, essays, poetry, journal entries, and fiction. Soulful, informational, eye- catching, and gut-wrenching, this anthology is a testimony of resilience and loss, of hurt and hope, of stories remembered and stories forgotten, of politics and the political, and what is possible when so much seems impossible.