Canon, Canyon, Cannon: All Black Everything

NIKKY FINNEY is the author of On Wings Made of Gauze; Rice; The World Is Round; and Head Off & Split, which won the National Book Award for Poetry in 2011. Her new collection of poems, Love Child’s Hotbed of Occasional Poetry, was released in 2020. Finney is Carolina Distinguished Professor at USC in Columbia where she is also Director of the Ernest A. Finney Jr. Cultural Arts Center.

Black. Lesbian. Mother/Father. Auntie/Uncle. Poet. Playwright. Performer. Drapetomaniac. Letta Neely’s first play, Hamartia Blues, was produced by The Theater Offensive at the Boston Center for the Arts in 2002. Her plays Last Rites and Shackles & Sugar have been produced in Boston, Philadelphia and Los Angeles. In addition to the chapbooks: gawd and alluh huh sistahs and When We Were Mud, Letta has written two books of poetry, Juba and Here (Wildheart Press). Her literary work has been included in numerous anthologies, literary journals, and bathroom stalls. As a member of the Traces/ Remain Ensemble with Deen Rawlins-Harris, she collaborated with Toshi Reagon's Emerson College residency: Parable Path Boston to develop the Seed to Harvest Book Project. She is the editor and scriptwriter of Ife Franklin's "The Slave Narratives of Willie Mae" (book and film). Letta is the Story Weaver in Residence at Emerson College’s Elma Lewis Center and hosts FireWater Poetics. She is a co-artistic director at Fort Point Theatre Channel; a member of the Her Story Is collective; and a co-director of the Revolution of Values Theatre Project with Greg Allen. She is the Executive Director of Apprentice Learning. She is currently touring “Pulling It All Into The Current” a one woman spoken word- infused play. The show has been to Boston, Edinburgh, New York City, New Hampshire, and her hometown of Indianapolis, Indiana.

Ungrateful Black Artist (UGBA – ‘oog ba’) (pronoun inclusive) is a queer poet, rapper, playwright, actor, and activist based out of Brooklyn, NY. UGBA is the founder/host of CEREMONIES—a Brooklyn based monthly Black-Queer artist showcase held in honor of Essex Hemphill. UGBA is also the founder of “Dark-Skin Support Group" a virtual support network for dark-skin Black Americans in need of a space to discuss the realities of colorism. In 2020, UGBA was named a “Black LGBTQ+ playwright you need to know " by Time Out NY. UGBA is the former script assistant for the Pulitzer Prize winning and five- time TONY nominated Broadway show “Fat Ham". He is an alumnus of the Public Theater’s #BARS program and Emerging Writers Group 2020-2023 cohort. He is a 2023 Artivism Fellow through Broadway Advocacy Coalition, a 2022 MAP Grant recipient, a 2020-2021 BAM Resident, a New York Stage & Film 2023 Founders’ award recipient and current Artistic Director at NY Writers Coalition. Image credit: IG - @jennyandersonphoto

Zenaida (they/them) is a Black & Queer Friend, community member and seeker from Georgia who has spent their entire adult life in Boston. They are a professional Quaker working for Quaker Voluntary Service. At Summer Camps they are called Calypso Myrtle Mystic Skye Puppet Mcfly. Zenaida has competed with and coached poetry at College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI), Rust Belt, the National Poetry Slam placing in the top ten each time and winning the last chance slam at Women of the World Poetry Slam (WOWP.) Zenaida founded the Feminine Empowerment Movement Slam which hosted 5 festivals in Boston. You can find their work at Pizza Pi Press, Button Poetry and Slam Find. Their debut full length book of poems is forthcoming with Game Over Books. Lately, Zenaida has been struggling to sleep, dreaming of Gaza & liberation & paying attention to every person and moment and flavor that they love.

Black, poet, queer-god, hip-hop feminist, womanist: Porsha Olayiwola is a native of Chicago who now resides in Boston. Olayiwola is a writer, performer, educator and curator who uses afro-futurism and surrealism to examine historical and current issues in the Black, woman, and queer diasporas. She is an Individual World Poetry Slam Champion and the founder of the Roxbury Poetry Festival. Olayiwola is Brown University's 2019 Heimark Artist -In -Residence and a poet laureate fellow with the Academy of American Poets. The author of i shimmer sometimes, too published by Button Poetry and Olayiwola is the current poet laureate for the City of Boston. Her work can be found published with TriQuarterly Magazine, The Boston Globe, Essence Magazine, Redivider, The Academy of American Poets, Wildness Press, The Museum of Fine Arts, The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and elsewhere. Olayiwola joined the faculty of Brandeis University as the Jacob Ziskind Poet-In-Residence in Fall of 2022.

Porsha Olayiwola, Photo Courtesy of the Artist.

DJ WhySham aka Your Community DJ is a four-time nominated DJ/Producer, Visionary, Activist, Traveler, Sister, God-parent and Dorchester Native. WhySham is the CEO of “Boston Got Next Entertainment and Bringing Back Boston (BBBMA) now known as “The Social Justice Trap Movement, Inc.' She believes in bringing music, hardship and pain together while creating events as a release for collective trauma. WhySham is an On-air Radio Personality for SparkFM Online (Lunch Is Ova) on Thursdays at 1PM ET.  Follow on Instagram: @whysham617.