The Poetry Gods

Welcome to Season 2, Episode 2 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk to one of our favorite poets and people, Patricia Smith live from Vassar College about all the books we won't get to read, poetry, music, and beyond. Check out the episode and look out for Part 2 on May 2nd, 2017. As always you can reach us at [email protected].

PATRICIA SMITH BIO:

Patricia Smith has been called “a testament to the power of words to change lives.” She is the author of seven books of poetry, including Incendiary Art (2017); Shoulda Been Jimi Savannah (2012), which won the Lenore Marshall Prize from the Academy of American Poets; Blood Dazzler (2008), a chronicle of the human and environmental cost of Hurricane Katrina which was nominated for a National Book Award; and Teahouse of the Almighty, a 2005 National Poetry Series selection published by Coffee House Press. Her work has appeared in Poetry, the Paris Review, the New York Times, TriQuarterly, Tin House, The Washington Post, and in both Best American Poetry and Best American Essays.

Her contribution to the crime fiction anthology Staten Island Noir, which she edited, won the Robert L. Fish Award from the Mystery Writers of America for the best debut story of the year and was chosen for Best American Mystery Stories 2013. Smith also penned the critically acclaimed history Africans in America (1999) and the award-winning children’s book Janna and the Kings (2003).

She is a 2014 Guggenheim fellow, a 2012 fellow at both MacDowell and Yaddo, a two-time Pushcart Prize winner, recipient of a Lannan fellowship and a four-time individual champion of the National Poetry Slam, the most successful poet in the competition’s history. She is currently working on a biography of Harriet Tubman, a poetry volume combining text and 19th century African-American photos, and a collaborative novel with her husband Bruce DeSilva, the Edgar-Award winning author of the Liam Mulligan crime novels.

Follow Patricia Smith on Twitter and Instagram:

@pswordwoman

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@_joseolivarez, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Snow for making our logo)

Welcome to Season 2 of The Poetry Gods! We're back! Thank you to everyone who has been politely and not so politely asking us about when Season 2 would drop. It's here. On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk to Tim Seibles about the body as embassy for communication, writing poems that are not just diplomatic, and much more. As always you can reach us at [email protected].

TIM SEIBLES BIO:

Tim Seibles is the author of several collections of poetry, including Body Moves (1988), Hurdy-Gurdy (1992), Hammerlock (1999), Buffalo Head Solos (2004), and Fast Animal (2012), which won the Theodore Roethke Memorial Poetry Prize and was nominated for a 2012 National Book Award. His latest book, One Turn Around The Sun, is available now. His work has also been featured in the anthologies In Search of Color Everywhere: A Collection of African American Poetry (1994, edited by E. Ethelbert Miller and Terrance Cummings), Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry (2009, edited by Camille Dungy), and Best American Poetry (2010, edited by Amy Gerstler).

Seibles’ honors include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, as well as an Open Voice Award from the National Writers Voice Project. In 2013 he received the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award for poetry. He has taught at Old Dominion University, the University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast MFA program, and at Cave Canem.

Seibles lives in Norfolk, Virginia.

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@_joseolivarez, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Snow for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 16 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we take you back to where it all started: the unreleased pilot episode of The Poetry Gods. We recorded this at the Solid Sound Fest where we were the WanderWord Poets In Residence. We wanted to take a step back to share where all of this started as we get ready to launch Season Two Of The Poetry Gods. See you soon, and as always you can reach us at [email protected].

Special Reminder: We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016 & Winter 2017. Bring The Poetry Gods to your campus! We would love to do a live show at your university!

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 15 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we answer your questions! We had a raucous time answering your questions about what to do when event organizers misidentify you as a slam poet, we talk about our influences as poets and writers, how we try to cultivate joy and love in our communities, talk about gatekeeping and answer a v important question from Safia Elhillo. We had so many questions that we could not answer all of them. Fret not! We will do a part two of this episode where we finish answering your questions in the near future! As always you can reach us at [email protected].

Special Reminder: We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016 & Winter 2017. Bring The Poetry Gods to your campus! We would love to do a live show at your university!

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 14 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we have a brand new "What's On Your Mind?" along with an archival recording of a poetry reading The Poetry Gods hosted at Berl's Brooklyn Poetry Shop on May 11th, 2016. Featured readers include: Camonghne Felix, Nate Marshall, José Olivarez, Aziza Barnes, Adam Falkner, Carvens Lissaint, Idris Goodwin, & Mahogany L. Browne.

Special Reminder: Episode 15 will be dedicated to clearing out our inbox, so please send us questions and comments, and we will shout you out on an episode. Email us at [email protected].

Special Reminder 2: We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016 & Winter 2017. Bring The Poetry Gods to your campus! We would love to do a live show at your university!

Follow Camonghne Felix on twitter: @KamoneFromPluto on instagram: @kamkilla

Follow Nate Marshall on twitter & instagram: @illuminatemics

Follow Adam Falkner on instagram: @adam_falkner

Follow Carvens Lissaint on twitter & instagram: @carvenslissaint

Follow Idris Goodwin on twitter & instagram: @idrisgoodwin

Follow Mahogany L. Browne on twitter & instagram: @mobrowne

Follow Berl's Brooklyn Poetry Shop on twitter & instagram: @berlspoetry

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 13 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk to Camonghne Felix about growing up in The Bronx & how she got started writing poetry.

Special Reminder: Episode 15 will be dedicated to clearing out our inbox, so please send us questions and comments, and we will shout you out on an episode. Email us at [email protected].

Special Reminder 2: We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016 & Winter 2017. Bring The Poetry gods to your campus! We would love to do a live show at your university!

CAMONGHNE FELIX BIO:

Camonghne Felix is a poet, political speechwriter and essayist. She earned an MA in Arts Politics at NYU, is a 2012 Pushcart Prize nominee, and the 2013 recipient of the Cora Craig Award for Young Women. You can find her work in various spaces, including Youtube, and in publications like Apogee, Union Station, and Poetry Magazine. She is also the author of the chapbook Yolk, published via Penmanship Books in March 2015 and in May of that year was listed by Black Youth Project as a “Black Girl From the Future You Should Know.”

Follow Camonghne Felix on twitter: @KamoneFromPluto on instagram: @kamkilla

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 13 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk to Camonghne Felix about growing up in The Bronx & how she got started writing poetry.

Special Reminder: Episode 15 will be dedicated to clearing out our inbox, so please send us questions and comments, and we will shout you out on an episode. Email us at [email protected].

Special Reminder 2: We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016 & Winter 2017. Bring The Poetry gods to your campus! We would love to do a live show at your university!

CAMONGHNE FELIX BIO:

Camonghne Felix is a poet, political speechwriter and essayist. She earned an MA in Arts Politics at NYU, is a 2012 Pushcart Prize nominee, and the 2013 recipient of the Cora Craig Award for Young Women. You can find her work in various spaces, including Youtube, and in publications like Apogee, Union Station, and Poetry Magazine. She is also the author of the chapbook Yolk, published via Penmanship Books in March 2015 and in May of that year was listed by Black Youth Project as a “Black Girl From the Future You Should Know.”

Follow Camonghne Felix on twitter: @KamoneFromPluto on instagram: @kamkilla

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 12 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk to Safia Elhillo about her writing journey & much more. As always, you can reach us at [email protected]. We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016. Bring The Poetry gods to your campus!

SAFIA ELHILLO BIO:

Safia Elhillo’s first full-length collection, The January Children, is forthcoming from University of Nebraska Press in 2017.

Sudanese by way of Washington, DC, a Cave Canem fellow and poetry editor at Kinfolks Quarterly: a journal of black expression, she received an MFA in poetry at the New School. Safia is a Pushcart Prize nominee, co-winner of the 2015 Brunel University African Poetry Prize, and winner of the 2016 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets. In addition to appearing in several journals and anthologies including “The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop,” her work has been translated into Arabic and Greek.

Safia has performed at venues such as TEDxNewYork, the South African State Theatre, the New Amsterdam Theater on Broadway, and TV1’s Verses & Flow. She was a founding member of Slam NYU, the 2012 and 2013 national collegiate championship team, and was a three-time member and former coach of the DC Youth Slam Poetry team. She is currently a teaching artist with Split This Rock.

Follow Safia Elhillo on twitter: @mafiasafia on instagram: @safiamafia

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 11 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we skip our usual segment of "What's on Your Mind?" to talk about names, phases, brands, publishing, & so much more with genius poet Morgan Parker. As always, you can reach us at [email protected]. We are looking to book shows for Fall 2016. Bring The Poetry gods to your campus!

MORGAN PARKER BIO:

Morgan Parker is the author of Other People’s Comfort Keeps Me Up At Night (Switchback Books 2015), selected by Eileen Myles for the 2013 Gatewood Prize. Her second collection, There Are More Beautiful things than Beyonce, is forthcoming from Tin House Books in February 2017. Morgan received her Bachelors in Anthropology and Creative Writing from Columbia University and her MFA in Poetry from NYU. Her work has been featured or is forthcoming in numerous publications, as well as anthologized in Why I Am Not A Painter (Argos Books), The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop, and Best American Poetry 2016. Winner of a 2016 Pushcart Prize and a Cave Canem graduate fellow, Morgan lives with her dog Braeburn in Brooklyn, NY. She works as an Editor for Amazon Publishing's imprint Little A and Day One. She also teaches Creative Writing at Columbia University and co-curates the Poets With Attitude (PWA) reading series with Tommy Pico. With poet and performer Angel Nafis, she is The Other Black Girl Collective. She is a Sagittarius.

Follow Morgan Parker on twitter: @morganapple on instagram: @morganapple0

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)

Welcome to Episode 10 of The Poetry Gods! On this episode of The Poetry Gods, we talk about language, whiteness, community, and much much more. This is part two of our conversation with genius poet, educator, organizer Mahogany L. Browne. If you missed part one, you should go back and catch up. As always, you can reach us at [email protected].

MAHOGANY L. BROWNE BIO:

The Cave Canem and Poets House alumnae is the author of several books including Dear Twitter: Love Letters Hashed Out On-line, recommended by Small Press Distribution & About.com Best Poetry Books of 2010. She has released five LPs including the live album Sheroshima. As co-founder of the Off Broadway poetry production, Jam On It, and co-producer of NYC’s 1st Performance Poetry Festival: SoundBites Poetry Festival, Mahogany bridges the gap between lyrical poets and literary emcee. Browne has toured Germany, Amsterdam, England, Canada and recently Australia as 1/3 of the cultural arts exchange project Global Poetics. Her journalism work has been published in magazines Uptown, KING, XXL, The Source, Canada’s The Word and UK’s MOBO. Her poetry has been published in literary journals Pluck, Manhattanville Review, Muzzle, Union Station Mag, Literary Bohemian, Bestiary, Joint & The Feminist Wire. She is anticipating the release of several poetry collections in 2015: Smudge (Button Poetry), Redbone (Willow Books) & the anthology The Break Beat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop (Haymarket). She is an Urban Word NYC mentor, as seen on HBO’s Brave New Voices and facilitates performance poetry and writing workshops throughout the country. Brown is also the publisher of Penmanship Books, the Nuyorican Poets Café Poetry Program Director and Friday Night Slam curator and currently an MFA Candidate for Writing & Activism at Pratt Institute.

Follow Mahogany L. Browne on twitter & instagram: @mobrowne

Follow The Poetry Gods on all social media:

@jayohessee, @azizabarnes, @iamjonsands, @thepoetrygods

& CHECK OUR WEBSITE:

thepoetrygods.com/

(much thanks to José Ortiz for designing the website! shouts to Jess X Chen for making our logo)