Andrea Abi-Karam is an arab-american genderqueer punk poet-performer cyborg, writing on the art of killing bros, the intricacies of cyborg bodies, trauma & delayed healing. Their chapbook, THE AFTERMATH (Commune Editions, 2016), attempts to queer Fanon’s vision of how poetry fails to inspire revolution. Under the full Community Engagement Scholarship, Andrea received their MFA in Poetry from Mills College. With Drea Marina they co-hosted Words of Resistance [2012-2017] a monthly, radical, QTPOC open floor poetry series to fundraise for political prisoners’ commissary funds. Selected by Bhanu Kapil, Andrea’s first book is EXTRATRANSMISSION [Kelsey Street Press, 2019] a poetic critique of the U.S. military’s role in the War on Terror. Simone White selected their second assemblage, Villainy for forthcoming publication. Andrea toured with Sister Spit in 2018 and has performed at RADAR, The Poetry Project, The STUD, Basilica Soundscape, TransVisionaries, Southern Exposure, Counterpulse, Poets House, Radius for Arab-American Writers. With Kay Gabriel they are co-editing an anthology of Radical Trans Poetics forthcoming from Nightboat Books in 2020. They are a leo currently obsessed with queer terror and convertibles.
Leonard Schwartz is the author of numerous books of poetry, including, most recently, Heavy Sublimation (Talisman House, 2018) and Salamander: A Bestiary (Chax Press, 2017), with painter Simon Carr. His workin poetics The New Babel: Toward a Poetics of the Mid-East Crises (University of Arkansas Press, 2016), is inclusive of poetry, essays, and interviews. Other titles include If (Talisman House, 2012), and At Element, which explore the idea of an eco-poetics, as well as A Message Back and Other Furors (Chax Press, 2008), The Library of Seven Readings (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2008), and Language as Responsibility (Tinfish Editions, 2006). He also edited and co-translated Benjamin Fondane’s Cine-Poems and Other, with New York Review Books. Schwartz hosts the radio program Cross Cultural Poetics, archived online at the University of Pennsylvania’s Pennsound. About his poetry Forrest Gander writes “Leonard Schwartz’s poems introduce philosophical meditation to emotional sensibility in a way that has become unusual in contemporary poetry. In his work, one feels the risk, even the vertigo, of the mind orienting itself to otherness, to world, and to language. The sublimating and uplifting rhythms of his poems are pierced with veins of divinity. One might say in fact that the body of his work unwinds a long Gnostic inquiry that begins to articulate the contradictions and complexities of a significant and richly felt thought.” About The New Babel, Joseph Houlihan writes in Entropy: “Through his poetry, Cross Cultural Poetics, as well as his work as an editor of poetry in translation, Leonard Schwartz engages in an explicit project to deepen bonds across cultural difference, in the service of creating a society that allows these differences. The New Babel offers a brief and worthwhile glimpse into this expansive and generous project.” Schwartz splits his time between Washington State and NYC.
National Book Award winner and Pulitzer prize nominated poet Cornelius Eady has set his poetry to song with the Cornelius Eady Trio. Eady’s songs tell the story of passing time, the Black American experience and the blues in the style of Folk & Americana music. Guitarists Charlie Rauh & Lisa Liu join Eady to create layered and graceful arrangements to bolster Eady’s adept craftsmanship as a songwriter, lyricist, & poet. Cornelius Eady Trio’s debut album called “Field Recordings” was released by Kattywompus Press on vinyl and digital download in February 2017. The album is available for purchase HERE. The Trio will be releasing their second album “2 Out of 3” in Spring 2018 on Kattywompus Press.
Porsha Olayiwola is the 2014 Individual World Poetry Slam Champion and 2015 National Poetry Slam Champion. In 2018, Porsha was named by GK100 as one of Boston’s Most Influential People of Color. She is the Artistic Director at MassLEAP, a literary non-profit organization in Massachusetts serving youth artists. She is an MFA Candidate at Emerson College and has a full length collection of poetry forthcoming in 2019 with Button Poetry. As an educator and organizer Porsha seeks to cultivate spaces for emerging artists that allow them to deepen their understanding of craft and community. She has served youth artists in the city of Boston for the last six years and continues to grow spaces for artists and audience of the art. Porsha Olayiwola is the current Poet Laureate for the city of Boston.
Denice Frohman is a poet and performer from New York City. She is a CantoMundo Fellow and former Women of the World Poetry Slam Champion. Her poems have appeared in Nepantla: An Anthology for Queer Poets of Color, Women of Resistance: Poems for a New Feminism, and elsewhere. She’s featured on hundreds of stages from The Apollo to the Nuyorican Poets Café, and co-organizes #PoetsforPuertoRico.
Michelle Tea is the author of over a dozen books of poetry, memoir, fiction, tarot how-too, children’s picture books and young adult fantasy. Her most recent, the essay collection Against Memoir: Complaints, Confessions and Criticisms, was longlisted forthe 2019 PEN/Diamonstein-Speilvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. She is the creator of the international phenomenon Drag Queen Story Hour, the online parenting zine Mutha, the long-running performance tour Sister Spit, and the Sister Spit Books series for City Lights. She currently curates the queer Amethyst Editions imprint at The Feminist Press, and co-curates and co-hosts JOSH, a monthly comedy house party, with the writer Tara Jepsen, in Los Angeles.
Cat Fitzpatrick teaches at Rutgers University–Newark. She wrote the book of poems Glamourpuss and co-edited the Stonewall-Award-winning anthology Meanwhile Elsewhere: Science Fiction and Fantasy from Transgender Writers. She is currently working on a verse novel in Onegin stanzas about trans women making terrible choices. This is a topic she knows a fair bit about.
Elinor Nauen’s books include So Late into the Night; My Marriage A to Z; CARS & Other Poems; American Guys; Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend; Ladies, Start Your Engines; and most recently, Now That I Know Where I’m Going. She was on the Board of Directors of the Poetry Project for 22 years. She lives in the East Village, sings with the Double Yews, and studies Norwegian & karate, in which she has a 3rd-degree black belt. Visit ElinorNauen.com for more.
Lonely Christopher is the author of the poetry collections Death & Disaster Series and The Resignation, the short story collection The Mechanics of Homosexual Intercourse, and the novel THERE. His plays have been presented in Canada, China, and the United States. His film credits include several international shorts and the feature MOM, which he wrote and directed.
Edwin Torres is a NYC native whose books include, XoeteoX: the infinite word object (Wave Books), Ameriscopia (University of Arizona Press), and The PoPedology of an Ambient Language (Atelos Books). Anthologies include: American Poets in the 21st Century: Poetics of Social Engagement,Who Will Speak For America, Angels of the Americlypse: New Latin@ Writing, and Aloud; Voices From The Nuyorican Poets Café. Recent collaborations include; Sowndhauz-an electro-lingo duo with Matt Harle, Poex-a collection of sound pieces created with Stephen Vitiello, and Resurrection-a site-specific installation performance with Julie Carr. He is editor of the forthcoming anthology from Counterpath Press entitled, The Body In Language: An Anthology.
Suzanne Goldenberg is a NYC based artist, activist and writer. She is the author of HELP WANTED and her forthcoming book GOING PRO. She hosts the CRUSH reading series at the Woodbine collective in Ridgewood, NY. Her work can be found at https://www.instagram.com/golden_suz/
hannah buonaguro (b 1991) is a poet and artist who lives by the sea and hosts reading and performance events in her home. she also hosts a monthly restaurant called ZAX in collaboration with Will Stewart. she has published two collections of poetry: time that does not tick and i can hear you all the way from today .
This is an older, archived version of The Poetry Project site. Information may have changed.
