Summer

2026

Editorial by Megan Douglass: Still Waters Run Deep: Cultivating Collective Conscious & Conscience

Movement. This is a word that gets bandied about regularly. It is also one that isn’t always so clear and carries many meanings. Meditation. This is a word that we… Read More

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Valerie Jean: April 2026 – The People’s Potluck

In the fall of 2025, the federal government came to a halt, unable to reach an agreement on a national budget. By October, word spread across the US that, beginning… Read More

Baba Wayne Curtis Edited by Kristian Davis Bailey: Artist Statement -“Driven by the Movement”

I don’t like explaining my work. I like to leave it up to people to decide.I like to joke that their interpretation is usually better than mine. If I have… Read More

Raina Rising: Movement Meditations

Writer. Birthworker. Abọriṣa Abolitionist. Mother. All of my identities are grounded in birth, transformation, and new ways of being. In my youth, I considered myself an activist. As a younger… Read More

Hoda Z. M. Amer: Dreams Of

In 2017, artist Barbara Fox (BF) designed a coin for the state of New Jersey, celebrating immigrant families as they enter through Ellis Island in pursuit of the American Dream.… Read More

Mary Kamal Gagnon: White Grief

Mural by Mary Gagnon located at the Artist Village in Brightmore, MI. I grew up in East Dearborn, the daughter of Arab immigrants, learning early that my body was always… Read More

Julia Cuneo: A Movement Family

My earliest memory is of a red metal wagon, a little rusty, covered in “No Scab Papers” bumper stickers. My childhood best friend and I remember holding hands from atop… Read More

Owólabi Aboyade: Dear Young Detroit: “a foundation ain’t the answer”

Featured article from the "Future Beyond Billionaires" exhibit held at Swords into Plowshares Peace Gallery. I’m writing this to you because you love Detroit; you build communities of care and… Read More

Abraham Paulos: The War Ant App

Sacred Spaces- Art from the Detroit 2050: Future Beyond Billionaires Exhibition

In Winter 2025, Riverwise partnered up with our friends at the Swords Into Plowshares Peace Center and Gallery for the Detroit 2050: Future Beyond Billionaires exhibition, which ran from November… Read More

CHii Thee Last Poet: We Have Had Enough

Featured article from the "Future Beyond Billionaires" exhibit held at Swords into Plowshares Peace Gallery. We have had enough of your governments We have had enough of your schools We… Read More

Josmine Evans: Healing with Hibiscus – Refreshing Mind, Memory and Movement with Tea

Editor’s Note: This recipe is a part of a series graciously offered from the community inspired kitchen of Josmine Evans, founder of the Detroit based Indigo Culinary Co. We hope… Read More

Breanna Krywko: Motor City

They demolished our neighborhoods so they could put up highways. They put up highways so they could build and sell cars. They sold cars so they could build and sell… Read More

Haikus By Eric

The Hydra Mutual Fund: Centering The Solidarity of Choice

Abortion may be protected in Michigan, but protection has never guaranteed access. For many people across the state, getting care is shaped by cost, distance, clinic closures, stigma, and the… Read More

Erin Posas: Every Day

This poem was written on a day when I was supposed to be doing grad school homework. I felt too distracted. I had spent much of the semester processing the… Read More

Marilyn Lowen: Detroit Elder Haiku

I miss the fist Joe miss my parents, grandparents & the Bob-lo Boat Note: Detroit Poet Laureate jessica Care moore recently invited Detroiters to write haiku for our city, so… Read More

John G. Rodwan, Jr. Poetry

Weather Report Unlike white men wearing short pants in Midwestern winter, wholly unworried that the car might not start – no waiting for buses with these guys – and confident… Read More

Valerie Jean Blakely: The world is burning, and all I want to do is watch the birds.

I like to be very still. Very quiet and listen to them sing. Then I am not thinking about Genocide, ecocide. Drones, bombs, and war. I am most certainly not… Read More

Larry Sparks: Make The Past Serve the Future

Benni Aho: The Paris of The West

She is bass lines and sirens. She is your relaxing reward for a day of hard work. She slaps the back of your head when you say something stupid. She… Read More

Bryce Grubbs: RAGE → LOVE

When I sit cross-legged in a handstand in contemplation on action - my action - anger spills onto my living room floors. Movement was spurred by anger, an anger that… Read More

Bill Wylie-Kellermann: (Un)Forgotten: Memory as Resistance and Resurrection

Think Detroit in the 1930’s: religious hate radio is being invented here - broadcasting white supremacy and antisemitism; corporate industrialists openly embrace fascism and turn guns first on the homeless… Read More

Interview by Erin Posas: “Detroit Got D Power”: From ghettotech to transit justice, artist DUANE is making big moves.

Meet DUANE: Still smoldering from the late March 2026 cover of the Detroit Metro Times, working with Godmother of House, DJ Stacey “Hotwaxx” Hale, catwalking to open a fashion show,… Read More

Keeping Memory: How Storytellers Respond During Urgent Time: A Conversation with Cornetta Lane Smith and Ifayomí Chistine

A recent executive order targeting exhibits deemed “divisive” or “race-centered” has placed institutions like the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture under pressure—raising urgent questions about how… Read More

Ava Ballew Poetry

Whatever You’ll Let Me You are not an easy person To come by, that is. Like a warm day in February, Melting the top two layers of compounded snow.… Read More

What It Really Means to Be Pro-Life: The Absurdity of Abortion Legislation in the U.S.

Right now, we are waiting. Waiting to see how our bodily autonomy will be infringed upon AGAIN. It harkens back to the unspoken rule about black bodies in this country.… Read More

An Analysis Brief on Sections of Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa The Importance of Questions: A Revolutionary Pedagogy and Praxis for 2022 Detroit

It is important to remember that in the preface to How Europe Undeveloped Africa (HEUA), Dr. Walter Rodney, at age 30, begins by focusing the reader’s attention to the fact… Read More

CUPID

Of course, we cannot say that Kyle Rittenhouse is guilty. Because this is America. And he is presumed innocent until proven otherwise. But for what it’s worth, he is White.… Read More

Mass Incarceration in the U.S.A.

Coalition Calls for Federal investigation into Detroit Police Use of Excessive Force

The Coalition for Police Transparency and Accountability is calling for renewed federal oversight of the Detroit Police Department (DPD) based on a 25 percent rise in incidents of excessive force… Read More

Joy in Community Study

Border & Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism by Harsha Walia, H In gloomy and despairing times, we who work for liberation generate light and joy.… Read More

Boggs Center Study Circles to Deepen, Grow and Struggle

“The core of our philosophy is that all human beings are capable of change. And that our desire as humans is to be healthy, to be whole, to feel safe… Read More

Kiswahili Lessons

EDITORIAL: No Borders, No Bars: Abolition Is the Only Way Forward

There are borders all around us. From our declarations of membership in a particular nation, to our identifications with our particular states, cities, or neighborhoods, to our establishment of cliques… Read More

border crosser

my father's story is not singular. he is a border crosser, he crossed the border, the border crossed him. filled with hope that looked like a stormy night. waiting in… Read More

Waawiyaatanong: From The Ashes, She Rises

Hadassah GreenSky is a Anishinaabe (LTBB Odawa) artist and multi-instrumentalist living in Detroit, Michigan. She is a graphic designer and painter, as well as a bead worker, dancer, seamstress, and… Read More

Climate Change Won’t Wait! Neither Should We! The Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition Demands Community Led Action for a Healthy and Just Future.

Since it’s founding in 2011, The Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition (MEJC) has worked tirelessly to put the needs of community members over those of corporations and front and center in… Read More

Building Pipelines For Peace: Pandemic Perspectives

Over the past two years, the chasm in our society between the “haves” and the “have nots” has grown to glaringly obscene levels. We’ve lost numerous members of our family,… Read More

Self-Care Isn’t Selfish: Implementing Well-Being Practices in Your Organization Benefits The Organization, The Movement, and Recognizes Our Humanity.

After surviving cancer, managing depression, and what feels like a perpetual string of life challenges I currently live my life in a perpetual state of self-reflection, self-awareness, and self-improvement. That… Read More