NY State Poet Laureate Patricia Spears Jones will headline on June 13. Over her 50+ year career as a poet, educator, and activist, Spears Jones has fostered a connection across generations to inspire serious discussions of social justice, environmental degradation, systemic oppression, and cultural resistance.
Additional poets include Ashna Ali, Geoffrey Babbitt, Ralph Black, Kathryn Cowles, Kathy Engel, Tokeya Graham, and more to be announced.
Patricia Spears Jones is a poet, playwright, anthologist, educator, and cultural activist. The current New York State Poet Laureate and winner of the 2017 Jackson Poetry Prize from Poets & Writers, she is the author of five books of poems, most recently, The Beloved Community (Copper Canyon, 2023) and A Lucent Fire: New and Selected Poems. Her poem “Lave” about Black female labor during the Great Migration was commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art. March-June 2025, she is partnering with Writers & Books to offer Across Generations: Creating New Democratic Vistas, an Academy of American Poets’ Poet Laureate Fellowship project.
To register, visit https://wab.org/poetry-festival-2025/
