Charles Coe

Editor’s Preface

We live in a time when environmental disasters, wars, social and political injustice, and the exploitation and abuse of the natural world are the causes of ever more human suffering. In this issue of “About Place,” our contributors have addressed the theme “Geographies of Justice” from a wide variety of global perspectives, and with powerful and compelling insights.

.chisaraokwu’s “When God Sat in Enugu, We Wondered Who We Were,” is a poetic meditation on horrific conditions in the Republic of Biafra during the Nigerian Civil War. Teow Lim Goh’s essay “Home Lands” asks what it means for an immigrant to be “at home,” and illuminates the troubling history of United States immigration policy. Flavian Mark Lupinetti’s short story “Corrections” is a droll and subversive look at the filming of a movie about “The Wall.”

All over the world people are demanding that their communities, their countries, devise more humane and responsible ways to care for our planet, and for each other. The contributors to this issue have added their voices to that demand. One challenge in editing this issue was that there wasn’t room for all the great work we received.

With that, I invite you to take a deep dive into “Geographies of Justice.” Your time and attention will be amply rewarded.

Charles Coe is the author of three books of poetry: All Sins Forgiven: Poems for my Parents, Picnic on the Moon, and Memento Mori, all published by Leapfrog Press. He is also author of Spin Cycles, a novella published by Gemma Media. Charles was selected as a Boston Literary Light by the Associates of the Boston Public Library and is a former artist fellow at the St. Botolph Club in Boston. A short film by filmmaker Roberto Mighty, “Peach Pie,” was based on his poem, “Fortress” and has been shown at film festivals nationwide. Another short film, “Charles Coe: Man of Letters,” also by Roberto Mighty was featured at the 2020 Roxbury Film Festival. Charles was a 2017 artist-in-residence for the city of Boston, where he created an oral history project focused on residents of Mission Hill. He is poetry editor of “Multiplicity,” an online literary journal published by Bay Path University in Longmeadow, Mass. Charles has served as poet-in-residence at Wheaton College and at the Chautauqua Institution in New York State and is an adjunct professor of English at Salve Regina University in Newport, Rhode Island, and Bay Path University in Longmeadow, Massachusetts, where he teaches in both MFA programs.

https://www.charlescoe.org

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