The Poetry Coalition, a group of 25 different national poetry organizations dedicated to promoting the value of poetry, launched their third annual program initiative this month called, “What Is It, Then, Between Us?: Poetry & Democracy.”

As part of the month-long program, the Academy of American Poets in New York City chose poets Pádraig Ó Tuama, Richard Blanco, Tom Sleigh, Brenda Hillman, and Solmaz Sharif to curate a series of poems every Saturday in March that explore the many facets of the First Amendment.

Blanco chose to focus on freedom of speech. He told Boston Public Radio on Wednesday that he thought “about those people who can’t speak, or those people whose freedom of speech has been compromised in some ways, or silenced in some way.”

This episode of “Village Voice” aired on WGBH Boston Public Radio on March 6, 2019.