Richard Blanco, who will debut his poem alongside the commission it inspired October 5. Photo: Joyce Tennyson

Rita Dove

Robert Pinsky

LIBERARTE presents original, new poems from 63 renowned poets around the world. These works are published by Beacon Press in the October, 2015 anthology LIBERATION: New Works on Freedom from Internationally Renowned Poets, and many of them are set to music commissioned for the LIBERARTE project.

Mark Ludwig, LIBERARTE'S creator and producer, invited these celebrated poets to respond to the question, "What does freedom mean to you?"  The result is artistic representation of the universal yearning for freedom spanning eighty-two poems, twenty-five countries, and countless stories of oppression, imprisonment, and liberation. This collection demonstrates the power of art to heal and to bring attention to freedom as a universal human right.

Many of the poets are Pulitzer Prize winners, Poet Laureates, and recipients of exceptional awards from PEN, the Guggenheim Foundation, and many others. You can find short biographies and links to more information here.

New works from sixty-three renowned poets from twenty-five countries:

(Anonymous) Afghan Women Poets: Landays
Francisco X. Alarcón, Chicano - USA
Meena Alexander, USA-India
Mary Jo Bang, USA
Dan Beachy-Quick, USA
Almog Behar, Israel
Esther Belin, Diné (Navajo)-USA
Richard Berengarten, England
Richard M. Berlin, USA
Richard Blanco, Cuban-American
Julie Carr, USA
Tina Chang, USA-China
Marilyn Chin, Chinese American
Gillian Clarke, Welsh-British
Kwame Dawes, Ghana/Jamaica/USA
Jiri Dedecek, Czech Republic
Oliver de la Paz, USA
Tsering Wangmo Dhompa, Tibetan American
Xue Di, USA-China
Carol Dine, USA
Han Dong, China
Rita Dove, USA
Ali Cobby Eckermann, Yankunytjatjara Australia
Anita Endrezze, Native American, European
Katie Ford, USA
Inga Gaile, Latvia
Diane Glancy, Cherokee-USA
Richard Hoffman, USA
Fanny Howe, USA
Tade Ipadeola, Nigeria
Yang Jian, China
Fady Joudah, Palestinian American

Ilya Kaminsky, USA-Ukraine
Mary Kimani, Kenya
Yusef Komunyakaa, USA
Joan Hutton Landis, USA
Luljeta Lleshenaku, Albania
Suzanne Lummis, USA       
Nick Makoha, England-Uganda
Salman Masalha, Arab, Israel
Adrian Matejka, USA
Jamaal May, USA
José Antonio Mazzotti, Peru
Dunya Mikhail, Iraqi American
Agi Mishol, Israel
Myriam Moscona, Mexico
Maria Negroni, Argentina
Jay Parini, USA
Wang Ping, Chinese American
Robert Pinsky, USA
Justin Quinn, Ireland
Milan Richter, Slovakia
Aaron Samuels, USA
Ernesto Santana, Cuba
Lloyd Schwartz, USA
Alan Shapiro, USA
John Skoyles, USA
Yermiyahu Ahron Taub, USA
Kirmen Uribe, Spain – Basque Country-Spain
Afaa Michael Weaver, USA
C. K. Williams, USA
Tsering Woeser, Tibet
Mark Yakich, USA

Written in 28 languages with expert translations:

Anonymous, Landays by Afghan Women
Translated from Pashtun by Eliza Griswold

Alma Behar, "Take this Poem and Copy It"
Translated from Hebrew by Dimi Reider

Han Dong, "Story"
Translated from Chinese by Nicki Harman

Inge Gaile, "Road"
Translated from Latvian by Leva Lesinska 

Yank Jian, "Lament' and "Empty Garden"
Translated from Chinese by Austin Woerner  

Luljeta Lleshenaku, "People Can Tolerate Everything..." and "The Unknown"
Translated from Albanian by Ani Gjika
 
Salman Maslha, "The Song About the Child"
Translated from Hebrew by Vivian Eden

Jose Antonio Mazzotti, "Death by Fire"
Translated from Spanish by Judith Filc

Agi Mishol, "Mother Tongue" and "No Casualties Reported"
Translated from Hebrew by Joanna Chen

Myriam Moscona, "what it was"
Translated from Ladino by Alonso Pérez de Salazar

 Milan Richter, "Liberation – and Return?"
Translated from Slovakian by John Minahane

Ernesto Santana, "The Day of Light"
Translated from Spanish by Pablo Pèrez Gonzàlez

Woeser Tsering, "Traces of the Chinese Year of the Rat"
Translated from Chinese by A. E. Clark

Kirmen Uribe, "Birds in Winter" and "Reading About Terezín"
Translated from Basque by Elizabeth Macklin

Xue Di, "Radiation"
Translation from Chinese by the author and Keith Waldrop