I wrote myself toward a
stronger version of myself.

~Roxane Gay

Let’s stand together for…

delicacy, real time writing, fierceness, meditation, vulnerability, questions, rest, mystery, fellowship, collective courage

A literary gathering for BIPOC students, faculty and allies. During this day-long event, we will center BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, Person of Color) experience and perspective. Our aim is to provide a safe and enriching environment that addresses the unique challenges faced by BIPOC writers and scholars.

Co-Sponsored by:
The Dean’s Office at Fordham College at Lincoln Center, The Office of the Chief Diversity Officer, The Creative Writing Program at Fordham, The Ampersand, Black Sheep Performance Poetry and Happy Hopes Mental Health at Gabelli Social Innovation Collaboratory.

2024

April 6th
10:00 am - 3:00 pm
Lincoln Center Campus
113 West 60th Street
Lowenstein 1021
New York, NY 10023

  • Opening Circle

  • Rest as Resistance

  • Spark Generative Writing

  • Real Talk Mentorship Lunch

  • Salon

  • Closing Circle

Caring for myself is not
self-indulgence, it is self-preservation and that is an act of political warfare.

~ Audre Lorde

LOGISTICS

  • Admission is free, though limited, and likely to fill quickly. RSVP at your earliest convenience, latest by March 28th.

  • Rose Hill Students: You can receive a free Ram Van Ticket by emailing MonaLisa at mtorresbates@fordham.edu

  • We’ll be writing together so please bring your favorite notebook and pen.

  • Our gathering will begin promptly at 10:00 am. Please make sure to arrive on-time or early. Attendees are expected to attend the entirety of our event. If you are unable to attend for the whole day, it is recommended that you elect another year to attend.

  • Attendees must read and abide by our Group Dynamics Agreement

Speakers

2024 TBA

Testimonials

  • As a graduating senior who has put much of my heart and soul into finding the parts of Fordham that I love and sharing it with others ….I can confidently say that this event l encompassed everything I love about and hope for Fordham into a single event. It was transformative, and warm, and inclusive. The cura personalis is shared to incoming Fordham students from our very first day, and this experience showed me what that tenet truly means in practice: carrying for the creativity, the presence, and the spirit of BIPOC and non-BIPOC staff, students, and guests in attendance alike. A presence designed /for/ BIPOC creativity is the most blessed gift Fordham could have given me as I close out my years at a school I love so dearly, and having this space for future students would be a gift, and a well-needed presence of inclusion, intention, and welcome. I pray that all current, future, and hopeful individuals within the Fordham community get the chance to experience the love and thought that was created at this retreat! I'm happy to have created the poem of community with everyone present.

  • One of the most illuminating experiences I've had in all of my four years at Fordham. I was so grateful to get to participate before graduating! It felt so special to be in a place created by and for BIPOC writers. From Opening Circle, I felt deeply connected to everyone in the space, and throughout our day together, I was nourished by my peers' work, and deeply inspired to create. I left the event believing more in myself and in poetry's ability to both heal and break barriers.

  • The day-long experience of getting to connect with other BIPOC writers allowed for such deep connection and conversation. I loved getting to write alongside fellow students and sharing our experiences at Fordham in the opening circle. It was such a lovely and important opportunity for us as students to connect and feel valued as writers and people. I'm so grateful to have had this opportunity—I left feeling inspired and eager to keep writing!

  • The Poetic Justice event was inspiring, & cathartic on so many levels. It felt so good to be in fellowship with other faculty and students of color & to be both encouraged to write & to treat the craft of writing as something sacred and worthy of protection. Thank you all for taking such good care of us. Kudos all around!

  • The Poetic Justice's "I wrote myself toward a stronger version of myself" was a necessary part of my Fordham experience, not just as a writer, but as a student. It is so easy to feel alone in your writing, not just in at PWI, but simply existing. The guest writers and professors really crafted this event to be an unforgettable and resourceful experience. Often, it feels like the industry must gatekeep, that it must be difficult, but this event opened my eyes to the opportunities and the networks that I did not believe existed or that I would have access to. The event is a must! This was the most empowering experience I have had at Fordham thus far.

  • To be able to fully engage in a safe and intimate environment—with students from all years, and with similar humanities interests as my own—was something that was necessary to my mental and emotional health at Fordham. I had looked forward to this event since it was advertised to me, and I was nothing short of pleased and grateful for the experience I was given. Everyone was vulnerable and participated with their full creativity and spirit. I look forward to participating next year and potentially hearing from a bigger crowd. We were taken care of with both food and guests. Ultimately, it was unforgettable and I am so grateful for its existence. I hope to apply to become a Poetic Justice Fellow next year when offered. It also sparked an interest for me within the creative writing program here at Fordham.

  • Working at Poetic Justice Institute's event was an incredibly restorative and much-needed pause to reflect on my role and responsibility in doing important social justice work and fostering community. Each attendee was able to be vulnerable and talk openly about why they had come to the event, their search for community, and the role of writing in social justice. I found myself very emotional at just how candid and honest we were able to be with one another - it's a rare kind of community that shouldn't be as rare as it seems to be. Hearing from the speakers as well was an incredible opportunity, the kind of advice you can only find from lived experience, a reminder that we need to treat ourselves as people and writers as opposed to products for consumption. I will definitely attend next year and plan to tell all of my friends to join as well!

  • There is resistance in rest. Getting rest and forming a community, even if just for a moment is radical in today’s world. This event provided me with that when I needed it most and I’m so grateful the opportunity to partake in it was available.

Past Speakers

Featured
Wo Chan
Wo Chan

Wo Chan, who performs as The Illustrious Pearl, is a poet and drag artist. They are a winner of the Nightboat Poetry Prize and the author of Togetherness (2022). Wo has received fellowships from MacDowell, New York Foundation of the Arts, Kundiman, The Asian American Writers Workshop, Poets House, and Lambda Literary. Their poems appear in POETRY, WUSSY, Mass Review, No Tokens, The Margins, and elsewhere. As a member of the Brooklyn-based drag/burlesque collective Switch N’ Play, Wo has performed at venues including The Whitney Museum of American Art, National Sawdust, New York Live Arts, and the Architectural Digest Expo. Find them at @theillustriouspearl.

Omotara James
Omotara James

Omotara James is an artist, editor and educator, based in New York City. She is the author of Song of My Softening (Alice James Books, 2023). Her work has received support from various organizations, including the African Poetry Book Fund, New York Foundation of the Arts, Lambda Literary, and Cave Canem Foundation.

Dante Micheaux
Dante Micheaux

Dante Micheaux is the author of Circus, which won the Four Quartets Prize from the Poetry Society of America and the T. S. Eliot Foundation, and Amorous Shepherd. His poems and translations have appeared in African American Review; The American Poetry Review; Callaloo; Literary Imagination; Poem­-A-Day; Poetry; and Tongue—among other journals and anthologies. Micheaux’s honors include the Oscar Wilde Award, the Ambit Poetry Prize, and fellowships from The New York Times Foundation and Cave Canem Foundation, where he currently serves as Director of Programs.

John Murillo
John Murillo

John Murillo is the author of the poetry collections Up Jump the Boogie (Cypher 2010, Four Way Books 2020), finalist for both the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Pen Open Book Award, and Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry (Four Way 2020), winner of the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and the Poetry Society of Virginia’s North American Book Award, and finalist for the PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry and the NAACP Image Award. His other honors include the Four Quartets Prize from the T.S. Eliot Foundation and the Poetry Society of America, two Larry Neal Writers Awards, a pair of Pushcart Prizes, the J Howard and Barbara MJ Wood Prize from the Poetry Foundation, an NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Cave Canem Foundation, and the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing. Recent poems have appeared in such publications as American Poetry Review, Poetry, and Best American Poetry 2017, 2019, and 2020. He is an assistant professor of English and director of the creative writing program at Wesleyan University.

Deborah Paredez
Deborah Paredez

Deborah Paredez is a poet, scholar, and cultural critic. She is the author of the poetry collections, This Side of Skin (Wings Press 2002) and Year of the Dog (BOA Editions 2020), winner of the 2020 Writers’ League of Texas Poetry Book Award and a New York Times "New and Notable Poetry Book." She is a professor of creative writing and ethnic studies at Columbia University and the co-founder of CantoMundo, a national organization dedicated to Latinx poets and poetry. Her book of literary nonfiction, American Diva, is forthcoming in 2024 from Norton.

Nicole Sealey
Nicole Sealey

Born in St. Thomas, U.S.V.I. and raised in Apopka, Florida, Nicole Sealey is the author of Ordinary Beast, finalist for the PEN Open Book and Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards, and The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named, winner of the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. Her honors include the 2021 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem, the 2021 Granum Foundation Prize, a Rome Prize from the American Academy in Rome, a Hodder Fellowship from Princeton University, the Stanley Kunitz Memorial and Poetry International Prizes, as well as fellowships from the Bogliasco Foundation, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, CantoMundo, Cave Canem, The Hermitage Artist Retreat, MacDowell, the National Endowment and New York Foundation for the Arts, and the Poetry Project. Her work has appeared in The Best American Poetry 2018 and 2021. She is a visiting professor at Boston University and teaches in the MFA Writers Workshop in Paris program at New York University.

I reckon — when I count it all —First — Poets — Then the Sun —Then Summer — Then the Heaven of God —And then — the List is done —But, looking back — the First so seems / To Comprehend the Whole —The Others look a needless Show —So I write — Poets — All —

— Emily Dickinson