May 24 & 31 - Unexpected Coalitions: Walt Whitman and June Jordan poetry workshop (y más)!
Beloveds, this sturdy street flower is rooting and growing along despite the compounding harsh climates of our neofascist era. I’m reaching to you with some updates…
Unexpected Coalitions: The People’s Poetry of Walt Whitman and June Jordan
Poetry workshop w/ Conor ‘Coco’ Tomás Reed
Sat, May 24 and 31, 1-3pm
CityLore, 56 E 1st St, NYC
RSVP today for both sessions, limited space!
This workshop weaves the vital legacies of two US poets: Walt Whitman, a European American gay man, and June Jordan, a Jamaican American bisexual woman. Reading across Whitman’s “Democratic Vistas” (1871) and Jordan’s “For the Sake of People’s Poetry: Walt Whitman and the Rest of Us” (1980), we will create unexpected coalitions through the process of writing and sharing poetry. We will read passages from both essays, and apply their insights to short writing prompts about present political crises and varied interpersonal needs. We will activate Jordan’s “Poetry for the People” pedagogies with such like-minded poets as Aja Monet and Solmaz Sharif. In the process, we will discuss how to create coalitions across our differences towards transformative care and social wellbeing.
This summer, I’m immensely proud to be hosted by CENTRO (Center for Puerto Rican Studies at CUNY) for a research fellowship to dive into archives on Puerto Rican feminist healthcare, anti-colonial learning, and dissident desires for a new book project, Hemisphere in Bloom. More details soon…
As ever, please reach out to co-conspire and co-create. I continue the search for sustainable employment, so affirming words and job leads are welcomed. And if you’d like to send this independent scholar-organizer a meal or rent support, don’t be shy (Venmo: ConorTomas, Paypal: cocoreed@gmail.com, Zelle: 979.204.9253).
The world is ours to transform! We must love and protect each other along the way.
-Coco