Tag: poets

Summer Music & Magic

I’ve been more quiet than usual because I’ve been dusting off my photography/summer counselor skills at Jewish surf camp (!) [more on that later, obviously] interviewing my share of incredible writers for Kirkus Reviews, reading and watching and reporting all of kinds of other things for other stories, finishing up my work in progress draft, for which I am in the final stages (last push! OMG!) and trying to find the essence of this thing they call the “summer slow down” (Have you seen it? Is it really real?)

Anyway, when the rest of the world is back to school and on a more regular schedule, I suppose I will be, too. In the meantime, I wrote this piece about the dynamic poet JP Howard, a Harlem native in Brooklyn and fellow VONA/Voice Workshop alum for Literary Hub, which posted today. I also spent some time writing this other piece for Bitch Magazine about my favorite albums from 1998, which I can’t even believe was 20 years ago!

I hope you’re enjoying your summer. How are you spending it out there?

Notes from the Bronx Book Festival

I wrote about the Bronx Book Festival for the Village Voice and how the Bronx is having a resurgence of the book scene with the work and leadership of Saraceia J. Fennell and Noelle Santos, but there were a couple of quotes from one of the panels that I wanted to add in the spirit of Throwback Thursday that didn’t fit in the context of the story that I wanted to put here.

  • “In this nation, the women’s movement was started by Black women. If we’re going to create a movement in this country that’s inclusive, we have to acknowledge indigenous women who get erased, and Black women specifically. That’s still not understood, which is why we struggle with solidarity. If your movement doesn’t lift all boats, we’re not going to win.”  — Sofia Quintero

 

  • “A large part of resistance is rejecting rejection…Part of the feminist project, especially in the arts, is a more liberating masculinity. It’s not that they don’t have privilege. Our feminism has to be one that heals and liberates everyone. We have to inform the brothers, but the brothers gotta do their own labor.” — Roya Marsh is one of the poets in the beautiful Black Girl Magic anthology, which you can buy here.
BronxBookFestHaul.JPG
I went a little overboard, but it was the first Bronx Book Festival, so what can I say? These are all Bronx authors, some books I bought from The Lit. Bar tent and a few that were given to attendees, plus my press pass which I will cherish for life.