Join MoAD and Black Freighter Press for the first event in our four-week Community Voices: Poets Speak series. Featured poets Briana Grogan and D'mani Thomas will share new original poetry written in response to the current exhibitions on view. They will also describe the processes of writing ekphrastic poetry in response to visual art.

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Every Friday at 5pm from January 12th-January 26th, different poets will read new work in the MoAD galleries. These readings and discussions culminate with an evening of performance by all the poets in this series on February 2nd.

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About the Poets

Briana Grogan (she/they) is a Black queer femme from Southern California. Her poetry found form in San Francisco, where they currently live and work as a community doula. She is a 2023 SFA grant recipient of the San Francisco Artist Commission. They received their MFA in Poetry from Mills College. Her writing explores the silence in grief and rejoice in healing. They were an artist in residence at Art House San Clemente, the Guest Poetry Editor for Foglifter Journal Vol. 8, and a finalist for the 2021 Button Poetry Chapbook Contest. Her work can be found in Foglifter Journal, The Ana, Obsidian: Literature & Arts in the African Diaspora, and is upcoming in When We Exhale.

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D'mani Thomas (he \ they) is a writer, nerd and aspiring filmmaker based in Oakland, California (Ohlone territory). He’s interested in the tiny moments that capture attention spans. He has received invitations to fellowship from The Watering Hole, Foglifter, Afro Urban Society, and UC Berkeley’s Art & Research Center via The Engaging the Senses Foundation. In 2023, they became a finalist for the 2022 Penrose Poetry Prize, and were awarded an emerging voices fellowship through PEN America for the 2023 cycle. D’mani’s debut chapbook, “Grown-up Elementary”, was published earlier this year through Nomadic Press (now available through Black Lawrence Press). Outside of poetry, catch them studying horror movies, dancing, and eating too many fries.

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This program series is presented in partnership with Black Freighter Press. Black Freighter Press publishes revolutionary books. They are committed to the exploration of liberation, using art to transform consciousness.  A platform for Black and Brown writers to honor ancestry and propel radical imagination.