S242. Speculating Darkly: A Poetry Reading

Room 205 A&B, Level 2
Saturday, April 11, 2015
3:00 pm to 4:15 pm

 

Taking its title and spirit from a series of essays written by poet Roger Reeves (published on the Poetry Foundation's "Harriet the Blog"), and subsequent reading series curated by poet and visual artist Krista Franklin, "Speculating Darkly, or The Folk Surreal Future," is a poetry reading that features some of the Midwest's emerging African Diaspora writers who focus on the Black Fantastic, the Grotesque, the Afro-Surreal, the Gothic, the speculative, and science fiction.


Participants

Moderator:

Bianca Spriggs is an Affrilachian poet and Cave Canem fellow. Currently a PhD candidate in English at the University of Kentucky, Bianca is the author of Kaffir Lily and How Swallowtails Become Dragons and serves as the managing editor for pluck! The Journal of Affrilachian Arts & Culture.

Keith S. Wilson is an Affrilachian Poet, Cave Canem fellow, graduate of the Callaloo Creative Writing Workshop, and recipient of a Bread Loaf scholarship. He holds an MFA in poetry from Chicago State University. Keith works as a writer and game designer in Chicago.

Kenyatta Rogers is a Cave Canem fellow and was a visiting poet in English at Columbia College Chicago. A Pushcart nominee and Best of the Net nominee, his work has been previously published in or is forthcoming from Jubilat, Vinyl, Court Green, the Volta, Rhino Poetry, and others.

Ladan Osman has received fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center, Cave Canem, and the Michener Center for Writers. Her work has appeared in American Life in Poetry, Narrative, and Prairie Schooner. Her poems appear in a new-generation African poets anthology. 

Airea D. Matthews, a Cave Canem and Callaloo fellow, is a 2014 Pushcart Prize nominee and a former Helen Zell Postgraduate Fellow in poetry at the University of Michigan, where she earned her MFA in poetry and was awarded the 2011 Michael R. Gutterman Prize. Her nonfiction prose, poetry, and fiction have appeared in a number of periodicals. She serves as associate editor for Shuf Poetry.

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