Jan
18
12:30am
the space between men: Mia S. Willis in Conversation with Maya Williams
By Charis Books and More/Charis Circle
This event takes place in person at Charis and on crowdcast, Charis' virtual event platform. This event is free, but registration is required for virtual attendance.
Charis welcomes Mia S. Willis in conversation with Maya Williams for a celebration of the space between men.
About the space between men: These piercing, surprising poems look to familial history, rituals of faith, and the natural world to explore how the intersecting cultures of Blackness and queerness relate to each other. As the collection evolves, the reader is challenged and empowered to seek expansiveness in spaces that have not previously been excavated, reckon with the complexities of interpersonal relationships, and explore memory as a catalyst for self-determination. Mia S. Willis weaves together intergenerational knowledge and personal discovery—not only to define themselves but to articulate a communal identity that transcends language.
About Mia S. Willis: Mia S. Williams (they/them) is a poet, popular educator, and cultural historian from Charlotte, North Carolina. Their work, twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize, has been featured by The Slowdown, The Shade Journal, Palette Poetry, The Offing, the minnesota review, homology lit., NarrativeNortheast, and others. Willis has earned fellowships from Cave Canem, La Maison Baldwin, The Watering Hole, Lambda Literary, and Chashama’s ChaNorth. A two-time Best of the Net nominee, they are the author of monster house (Jai-Alai Books, 2019), the 2018 winner of Cave Canem’s Toi Derricotte & Cornelius Eady Chapbook Prize.
About Maya Williams: Maya Williams (ey/em, they/them, and she/her) is a religious Black multiracial nonbinary suicide survivor who is currently an Ashley Bryan Fellow and was selected as the seventh Poet Laureate of Portland, Maine for a July 2021 to July 2024 term. Maya's debut poetry collection, Judas & Suicide, is available through Game Over Books . Eir second poetry collection, Refused a Second Date, is available now from Harbor Editions. Maya's third poetry collection, a chapbook: What's So Wrong with a Pity Party Anyway? , is available now. Maya's collections are a finalist of a New England Book Award, a finalist of a Maine Literary Award, and a winner of Garden Party Collective's chapbook contest respectively.
The event is free and open to all people, but we encourage and appreciate a donation of $5-20 in support of the work of Charis Circle, our programming non-profit. Donate on crowdcast or via our website, or in person at the event with cash, card, or digital payment.
If you have any questions regarding these guidelines or to request specific accessibility accommodations including ASL interpretation, please contact [email protected] or call the store at 404-524-0304. If you would like to watch the virtual event with computer-generated captions, please watch in Google Chrome and enable captions.
By attending our event you agree to our Code of Conduct: Our event seeks to provide a harassment-free experience for everyone, regardless of gender, gender identity and expression, age, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, ethnicity, religion (or lack thereof), class, or technology choices. We do not tolerate harassment in any form. Unsolicited sexual language and imagery are not appropriate. Anyone violating these rules will be expelled from this event and all future events at the discretion of the organizers. Please report all harassment to [email protected] immediately.
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Charis Books and More/Charis Circle
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