1,945 writers have signed the Writers in Support of the Occupy Movement petition since the site opened in mid-October. The petition is composed of a single sentence: “We, the undersigned writers and all who will join us, support Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy Movement around the world.”
The site now seeks submissions: “If you’d like, visit your local occupation and write about it—a paragraph, a poem, a comic, a story, a vignette, anything goes—and send it our way. We’re looking for original writing by signatories to the list. What kind of writing is up to you, but we’re especially interested in hearing accounts, in any form, of your experiences at Occupy camps and protests around the world.”
The site now includes short essays by different writers, including Francine Prose, Lemony Snicket, D.A. Powell, Duncan Murrell, Anne Waldman, Danica Novgorodoff and Michael Voll, Maureen Miller, Daphne Carr, Alice Walker, Paula Z. Segal, John McManus, David Hollander, Blair Braverman, Scott Sparling, Joshua Cohen, Larry Heinemann, Sara Paretsky, Judith Butler, Sarah Schulman, Ann Neumann, Eileen Myles, Amirah Mizrahi, Jerry Stahl, Ursula K. Le Guin, Jorie Graham, Craig Clevenger, Nathan Schneider, Francesca Lia Block, Alfred Corn, Cara Hoffman, Dana Spiotta, JoAnn Wypijewski, Matthew Zapruder, Vanessa Huang, and Jonathan Lethem.
Here’s an excerpt from a poem submitted by the great Alice Walker:
“It moves my heart to see your awakened faces;
the look of “aha!”
shining, finally, in
so many
wide open eyes.
“Yes, we are the 99%
all of us
refusing to forget
each other
no matter, in our hunger, what crumbs
are dropped by
the 1%.”