Cover reveal! Let The Poets Govern, 2026. What a time to be writing about freedom and departure. I feel terrified and so honored to share this work with you. Thank you, in advance, for holding it with care. We up!!!
DYSCALCULIA: A Love Story of Epic Miscalculation, available everywhere books are sold (but especially your local bookstore) Valentine’s Day, 2023.
Pre-order link In bio. Click it and plz tell your friends!! Love u
The ride begins…
One year ago, this incredible cutie was at home, bleeding out on the pillow in a totally blissful stupor after top surgery. I was terrified for the 3 hours of the surgery. But when we got home, and they stood in front of the mirror, and that big smile cracked across their face, all I could think was: god bless you. We’re on vacation celebrating this milestone and here they are, chest out, living the way they want to. Forever proud of you my love.
The doctors are in! That’s right, we’ve brought back Poetry Therapy this year for this month’s bonus episode!
•
•
If you’ve ever felt like you didn’t “get it” when it comes to poetry, we’ve got five incredible poets who can help: @_joseolivarez@bardsbesidebars@camonghne@illuminatemics & @yesikastarr . They each picked a poem they love — we read it, break down how and why it works, and lean into what is exciting about the poem.
•
•
What poem would you want to discuss for a poetry therapy session?
•
•
Whether you love poetry, don’t understand it, or are somewhere in between, this episode is for you. It is live now exclusively on Patreon and Substack. A little 15 minute preview is in the main feed.
•
•
#thestacksunabridged #thestackspodcast #poetrytherapy
New Substack on Black art, Black institutions, and Black exceptionalism. Black excellence is a attack on Black imagination and Black art, and we know it. But proximity is a drug.
New essay in Harper’s Bazaar about the language we need right now and about the political precision it takes to get there!
Also, a few outtakes from a few days of getting to love on the people I love 🥰 oh and a selfie from my office because the semester is almost over and I ate that and I’m feeling myself
Announcing our 2026 City of Providence ACT Pell Lecture on the Arts & Humanities! This year’s theme is “The Artist and the Revolution,” and we are excited to welcome National Book Award longlisted poet, writer and former political strategist Camonghne Felix, author of Let The Poets Govern: A Declaration of Freedom as our keynote speaker.
The evening will also feature engagements and performances by Sussy Santana, Justice Ameer, Yoruba 2, Mayor Brett P. Smiley, Emily Ward Crowell, youth leaders from the Providence Student Union, Kai Cameron and April Brown.
We hope you join us for this free, galvanizing one-night event.
This project is supported in part by a grant from the Rhode Island Semiquincentennial Commission (RI250)
This event is made possible through partnerships with local businesses Symposium Books and Suya Joint. Let The Poets Govern will be available to purchase through Symposium Books at this event.
The 2026 Pell Lecture on the Arts & Humanities will be Wednesday, April 22, 2026 from 5:30-8:30 PM at The Pavilion at Grace, 300 Westminster Street, Providence, RI.
Head to the link in our bio to read more and register for this free event!
Yerrrrrrrrr!
It’s been a month since Let The Poets Govern came out. I spent the last 2.5 months in NYC being grown in the city that gave me the blessing of childhood, which is a blessing someone attempted to take from me too early. I read lots of Biss, lots of Didion, and read a few months ago their Goodbye To All That essays about their time in NYC and what it’s like to live there (or to be alive in it). I read them as I sat in a home in Brooklyn after having sat in D.C. for so long that I forgot what home feels like. So I wrote a response to Didion and Biss, their city-malaise, their departures — new on my Substack.
Also here’s some outtakes from the last three months, most of which are from my time in NYC.
Also! To everyone who is supporting LTPG — posting about it, reviewing it — my heart owes you. I’m touched and grateful. And more than anything I feel taken care of. Thank you.
Also!! I like the trash in P1, it’s humanizing.
REPRO BOOK RECOMMENDATION: @camonghne , thank you for writing Let The Poets Govern: A Declaration of Freedom. I received the audiobook courtesy of @prhaudio and it was the balm on my soul as I drove to and from school. The book is a memoir-manifesto-poetic rhetorical analysis-reckoning as a radical trying to make our politics fit in this messy system. I found myself in Camonghne’s stories of her experiences as a political and electoral organizer trying to bring about some semblance of radical change. I too am feeling out of place as I reflect on 15 years of trying to shift a static movement toward more radical liberatory politics when it doesn’t want to be and yet I’m still heartbroken and disappointed each time. Reading this book was like reading my own thoughts as we followed similar trajectory of trying to navigate old ships only to realize that we were just rearranging deck chairs as it sank. The book is so good I had to go pick up a print copy (signed by Camonghne!) to have so I can highlight and refer back to it. Her writing is so soothing and connections to history and vision for what should be are so deep. I really loved that she named this failure of President Obama and Democrats to protect abortion when they could, rather trading it away and now we have nothing. Too few people are willing to talk about how the current situation was created by Democrats’ refusal to push for real access when they had the chance. Instead they’re issuing empty promises and half measures. Everyone in repro should pick this book up, for the repro analysis but also the indictment of our political system overall.
I also picked up Toni at Random by @danaawilliamsink (shoutout to a fellow @amistadbooks author!) and saw @politicsprose Union Market put Liberating Abortion on their Women’s History Month display!!
Happy repro reading!
Join us in Clarksdale and Oxford, MS! 📍
We’re excited to be back in Mississippi for two in-person events featuring National Book Award–honored authors Camonghne Felix and Sarah Thankam Mathews.
On Wednesday, March 25 at 11:15am CDT, Felix and Mathews will be in conversation with Aimee Nezhukumatathil on the possibilities of writing, in partnership with the Coahoma County Higher Education Center.
Then, on Thursday, March 26 at 11:30am CDT, Felix and Mathews will be at the Oxford Conference for the Book, for a conversation on writing boundaries with A. H. Jerriod Avant.
Swipe to learn more about the events, and join us in person by visiting the link in bio. 🔗
Let The Poets Govern is on Harper’s Bazaar’s 25 most anticipated books of Spring!
I should say that nonfiction sales across the board are down significantly this year. If you love a nonfiction author please support them!
Join me Monday 3/16 at KGB. New Schoolers Camonghne Felix, Wendy Xu, and I will be reading upstairs. Oh, and adding Monica Ferrell to the roster! :)
Doors 7, reading 7:30. Two-drink minimum, 21+.
Looking forward to talking between the poems!
@kgblitjournal@kgbbarredroom@evgrieve@newschoolwriting #EastVillageNYC #EastVillageEvents
