Collection of Poems

Authors

  • Maya James The New York Public Library

Keywords:

Mama, sissy, Queenie, First crush, Grabbed, Alter call

Abstract

This is a collection of poems by Maya James which capture the sociohistorical experiences and stories of women within her life.

Author Biography

Maya James, The New York Public Library

Maya James, a night writing child of the moon who resides in Brooklyn, has been getting in trouble for telling stories since 1987. She grew up surrounded by old women and their stories. Ever since she was a little girl, old they would sidle up beside her smelling like hard work and peppermints, needing to unload their troubles, prayers, and blessings on an unbiased ear. This inspired that little bookish girl to pursue the writer’s life. A multimedia writer, she loves to blur the lines between genres; between the seen and unseen in order to capture the black surrealism of her world. That Carolina, that Baltimore, that Diaspora, that great south to north migration magic.

Her poetry has been published in Drum Voices Revue and Fokus Magazine. Maya's fiction has been published in the The Liberator Magazine, and she is a fellow of the Callaloo writing workshops out of Texas A&M Univ. She is also a first place winner of the College Language Association's Short Story Competition; winner of the Dr. Floyd Gaffney National Playwriting Competition at the Univ. of California, San Diego; and recipient of Howard University’s Owen Dobson Award for Dramatic Writing. Theatre credits include: Fences (Consultant) Triad Stage, Greensboro, NC; Mother Wit and Water Born ( Director), National Black Theatre, NY, NY; Itagua Meji (Director), Rutgers University; Sonography of Sound: A Choreopoem (Director/Playwright/Poet) Harvard University; Debajo del Laurel (Director), Teatro Latea, NY, NY; Mi China De Oro (Director) Brecht Forum, NY, NY; and Wading in the Water (Playwright), University of California, San Diego. She currently resides in Brooklyn, NY writing and is an Education Fellow with The New York Public Library.

Published

2018-08-21

How to Cite

James, M. (2018). Collection of Poems. Understanding and Dismantling Privilege, 8(1), 86–95. Retrieved from https://wpcjournal.com/article/view/17483

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 1 (2018): Understanding & Dismantling Privilege

Section

Creative Works & Self-Reflections

License

This journal is an academic publication. Its sole purpose is the dissemination of knowledge to as wide an audience as possible. The journal is free to individuals and institutions.

Copyrights for contributions published in this journal are retained by the authors, with first publication rights granted to the journal.

Copies of this journal or articles in this journal may be distributed for research or educational purposes free of charge and without permission. However commercial use of the journal or the articles contained herein is expressly prohibited without the written consent of the author.


NOTE TO AUTHORS:  
A new model, the Creative Commons approach, with split copyright is rapidly evolving and worth considering.

http://creativecommons.org/choose/