Making his home in Albany, NY, Victorio Reyes Asili is a PhD candidate at the University at Albany, working on his dissertation entitled Mic Check—Finding Hip Hop’s Place in the Literary Milieu. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing and Poetry from The Vermont College of Fine Arts. Reyes Asili is also a regular panelist on Hip Hop, poetry, and other issues relating to craft and professionalization at the annual Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference (AWP). His poems have appeared in many literary journals including The Acentos Review, Word Riot, Pilgrimage Magazine and Obsidian, and his work has been anthologized in Chorus: A Literary Mixtape, It Was Written—Poetry Inspired by Hip Hop, Black Lives Have Always Mattered, and the forthcoming Boricua en la Luna: An Anthology of Puerto Rican Voices.  In addition to his work as a scholar and poet, Reyes Asili has been a lifelong activist and served as the executive director for the Social Justice Center of Albany for eleven years. 

Website: victorioreyes.blogspot.com

Twitter Username: @ghettohippie

Publications

• "Insufficient" - Black Lives Have Always Mattered , 2Leaf Press (May 17, 2017)
• "Happiness" - Chorus , MTV Books (September 20, 2012)
• "Attempting to Grieve" , Acentos Review (November 1, 2011)

Awards

• Phyllis Liston Hurd Poetry Prize(2018)
• 40 under 40 Latino Rising Stars in New York State(2012)

Employment

• Full Time Lecturer at University at Albany (January 2017 - )

Degrees

• Bachelor of Arts in English from Adelphi University (April 1998)
• Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing - Poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts (January 2014)
• Doctoral Degree in English from University at Albany

Genres of Interest

Creative nonfiction, Poetry