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Rakaya Fetuga tells stories through prose, poetry, and performance. From the age of 17, Rakaya landed upon London’s poetry scene, and since then, her words have taken her across the country and the world, performing on stages from Qatar to Cuba. Rakaya’s writing has spearheaded an array of campaigns for the UN, L’Occitane and Cartier amongst others. Receiving writing awards from the New York TV & Film Festival (2024) and Royal Holloway University of London (2015 & 2016), as well as winning poetry competitions such as the Roundhouse Poetry Slam (2018), Rakaya’s words spark joy, challenge, and inspire meaningful reflection in her listeners. With a Master's in Literature & Creative Writing, Rakaya has been published in anthologies by HarperCollins, Pan Macmillan, and Penguin Random House. An advocate for self-expression, Rakaya finds joy in creating spaces of inspiration, connection, and community. Imitation is the Highest Flattery Iqra wasn’t allowed to go to parties. So, she savoured times like these when her parents were away, and she was left under the lax rulership of her oldest brother. Iqra pulled each outfit choice out from the back of her wardrobe and lay them carefully on the bed: a blue, puff-sleeve mini dress (which she usually wore as a top), bootcut jeans paired with a cherry t-shirt (self-customised as a crop top using scissors from the kitchen drawer), and the choice she already knew she would make in the end, her brand new LBD. Iqra had hidden it in the depths of their overburdened wardrobe straight after buying. Not even Umm Salama had spotted it - her sister would surely have picked a fight with her if she had.    Umm Salama was the prison guard Iqra needed to get around on most occasions. She was only three years older than Iqra, but was such a naggy agent of sensibleness, adamant that Iqra would have none of the fun she denied herself.  Iqra got invited to a lot of parties. They were the way for the girls at her private, single-sex boarding school in Kent to construct their own playground of flirtation with the boys from the other schools in the area, and simply to have fun away from the gaze of their housemistresses.  This Easter holiday, Gaia was hosting. It was perfect timing for Iqra because her parents had already left for Abuja a week earlier, catching the cheaper flights before everyone else bound by the academic calendar clogged the airports. Gaia’s own parents were ‘cool’ and were satisfied to order the kids pizzas and step out for the evening, as long as Gaia promised to clean up at the end of the night. Her mum and step-dad both worked in film production and would sometimes leave Gaia with a childminder, which Iqra envied, supposing one of those would be far less annoying than three older siblings and three younger, perpetually elbowing into Iqra’s personal space and eating the last of the dambu nama straight from the packet.    Fancy dress was sometimes an element of their play at the house parties, and a welcome excuse to wear something hot. Gaia told Iqra there was no theme this time, and just to come ‘looking spicy’, an assignment she was sure to excel at. Her new, black, spaghetti-strap mini dress was bought in the Boxing Day sales and had been hiding away the whole term. Iqra tried it on with a t-shirt underneath, and then without, unsure whether she should fill her bra out a bit more so the dress wouldn’t look so saggy at the top.  Puberty tripped up even the most confident of girls. She wasn’t short on self-assurance usually. Iqra believed in a unique middle child theory: being at the centre of the family meant she sucked in all of its beauty with nucleus-intensity. If not that, she had simply been chosen by Allah to be the pretty one. Full lips with an attractive dark outline like a Bratz doll, high-tilting eyes and naturally fair skin, yellow like an Igbo. But she was slow on producing in the chest region. She pushed some hijab undercaps into her bra and went to the bathroom down the corridor from her room to look in its full-length mirror.  She posed with her new bust, one hand on her hip and one at the meeting of her bare thighs. It could work – but she’d wear the t-shirt as well. Iqra imagined how embarrassing it would be for someone to hook a finger into the cotton and pull the hijab cap out. She would have to laugh it off or call the culprit ‘dirty’ for noticing in the first place. All the girls did it. Last week, Gaia was showing off her bum pads in dorm – proper ones, sewn into her cycle shorts.  “I need the toilet!” The voice of Iqra’s youngest sister, Hamdalah, interrupted the outfit preparations. Iqra cracked the door open and Hamdalah rushed into the bathroom immediately. With six brothers and sisters, you were never ever alone for long, even in the toilet or the corridor. Umm Salama was there too now, sitting on the stairs, picking shed hair out of her combs and afro pics.  “You lot are grim! You have to clean these after you use them,” Umm Salama complained.  Hamdalah started to pee without even closing the door, so Iqra pulled it shut behind her, and was noticed by Umm Salama. Her whiney tone flipped instantly to one of self-important, stern authority. “Where are you wearing that to?”  Iqra rolled her eyes, “My room.” She marched back into the bedroom, swinging the door, but Umm Salama sped in to catch it before the slam. Unfortunately, the sisters shared a bedroom and there was no way to lock her out. Iqra continued getting ready, ignoring the judging eyes that followed her from wardrobe to vanity to the shoebox under the bed where her jewellery was kept. “I knew Mum and Dad shouldn’t have sent you to that school. Are you even Muslim anymore?”  Iqra scoffed, pulling her braids into a high ponytail, “You’re so 2D. Being Muslim isn’t about clothes.” “Do all your white friends even know you’re Muslim?”  “Duh,” Iqra retorted. Although when she thought about it, perhaps not everyone did. She didn’t pray at school, and she doubted anyone at Kent Hill Girls had enough Islamic knowledge to know her name was Arabic, a quote from the first chapter revealed of the Quran. The only reason her faith ever came up was at Ramadan when she’d skip lunches and spend extra time sleeping. But for those who didn’t ask, they could quite easily assume she was another of the several aspiring anorexics at school. There was no need to offer up extra information about her homelife and multitude of embarrassing siblings. People were always going to assume something, so she let them.  “And why do you assume ,” Iqra quipped, accusingly, “that none of my friends are Muslim themselves?” She mentally conjured the image of Amira Khan, a girl two years above her, who had once led a peer support session for the girls in her Dormitory House. Hardly a friend but not a nemesis either. Unconvinced, Umm Salama kissed her teeth, “Put some tights on. Noone needs to see your arse.”  Was that it? No more lecturing?  Iqra teetered between wondering what was wrong with her sister and seizing this rare occasion of leaving without a big fight. She took the blessing and let the disagreement end there.   Iqra got to Gaia’s house with the giddiness of the forbidden in her stomach. Even though her parents wouldn’t approve and Umm Salama was cursing her from her bitter little corner of the bedroom, Iqra wasn’t doing anything wrong. When the other girls got hold of neon drinks in glass bottles, she never drank any. She didn’t smoke when they did, and she never let the boys near her. It was just fun, just dancing and just making sure they knew she was in charge of her life as much as they were.  At the front door, Iqra could hear the voices and laughter inside and waited for someone to come let her in. A boy opened the door and screamed “Dayyum,” at her before spluttering with laughter. It was a strange welcome, but not as strange as his appearance. Iqra eyed the boy in the doorway cautiously, his tacky fake-gold neck chain and clip-on earring, the baggy t-shirt and jeans swamping him, his bony white forearms sticking out of the fabric, and most concerning of all, the dirt smeared across his face.  “Who is it?” it was Gaia’s voice calling from inside.  “Your mate,” the boy said, skipping down the tiled corridor, where Gaia passed him with a gradual strut, concentrating on not falling over in her massive stilettos. Iqra stepped inside but left the door open, wanting the light from the afternoon sun to confirm what she was seeing. Gaia too had painted her face – not in the carelessly slathered way of the boy, but she had evenly brushed foundation over her skin that was several shades too dark. She didn’t quite make it to the edges of her eyes, giving her a reverse-panda look.  “Iqra! Hey babe, you made it! Take off your coat – I wanna see your fit,” Gaia pulled down the shoulders of Iqra’s open jacket as far as she could, stopped mid-way by Iqra’s fist clenching the sides together.  “What’s on your face?” Iqra asked in a small, shocked voice.  Gaia giggled, pulling Iqra through the corridor towards the living room, “Oh, we did a theme last minute. Destiny’s Children!” She was smiling wide from her stupid brown face, balancing an expression of innocence and defiance. Music was pumping from the CD player and speaker, which stood beside the TV. No one was dancing, but everyone was standing, and they turned to look at Iqra, along with Gaia, waiting for her to react.  Iqra thought about slapping Gaia’s cheek, transferring the make-up mess to her own white palm. It suddenly occurred to her that she was the only Black person there, the only true brown face at the party apart from one Asian girl that Iqra had no classes with, who stood at the back of the room sipping her juice through a straw. Iqra felt loneliness push through her throat like a swallowed stone. Everyone was looking, but the loud music covered her words enough to have this moment with her friend before addressing the room.  Iqra shook free of Gaia’s grip and instead grabbed the girl by both of her arms. “What is on your face?” she demanded.  “It’s just–” Gaia stammered, going wide-eyed like a guppy. “The shade is Espresso.” “It’s butters,” Iqra said, scrunching her face. She learned from dealing with her younger siblings that her disapproval was more lethal than her rage.  “What?” Iqra scanned the room before she answered. They were still the spectacle. She couldn’t break her front. “You look fucking stupid, Gaia.”  The girl drooped her lips, reddening behind the makeup, the rumble before a tantrum-cry. She heard someone hiss, “ Told  you it was a bad idea.” Quickly, Iqra grabbed her friend Rebecca, who, thank God, had kept to her original shade, and gave her an energised hug.  ‘Don’t Cha’ by The Pussycat Dolls was playing, so Iqra started to sing along, nodding for Rebecca to do the same. Iqra shimmied out of her coat and started to dance, jumping up and down so her braids bounced and hoop earrings flipped from neck to cheek. The room was split – half watching her and Rebecca, who obediently followed Iqra’s dancing lead, and half looking towards Gaia, who had probably run back out of the room to cry.  Iqra wanted to cry. It was she who deserved to cry. The embarrassment was making her nauseous, but she kept bouncing, smiling, singing. Don’t cha wish your girlfriend was hot, like me? Is this how she looked to them? A Black, espresso-coloured girl. So foreign they could wear her as costume. Don’t cha wish your girlfriend was a freak, like me? She was their freak – and not the sexy kind.   Whatever fog of obscurity she thought may have hidden her religion, there was no mistaking everyone knew she was Black.  So what?  She screamed in her brain. Didn’t they all wish to be her anyway? She was the desirable, unattainable beauty that Gaia could never reach. They were stupidly jealous, Iqra told herself. She was a naturally occurring phenomenon, already perfectly formed for Destiny’s Child. A pearl needing no more refinement than good mascara and a generously filled bra.   After taking mental note of everyone there, every complicit face, and forming a vengeance list in her cranium, she left the party early, wrapped in her coat and a wry smile. Iqra didn’t want to show them an ounce of sadness, and once she was out in the early evening air, she dropped the façade and cradled her fury. Her fury carried her home. Her fury lit fire under the 314 bus wheels and smoked her to her front door in record time.  Umm Salama was in the kitchen scraping the burnt oily bottom of the jollof pot, and laughed that her sister had quit the party so early, her mouth open and red as a dragon’s tongue. Iqra, feeling safe enough to spit fire back, released all her fury on her unsuspecting big sister, shooting a tirade of flaming insults, ending with, “That’s why no one likes you.”  Umm Salama erupted. Not in the way Iqra thought she would, or hoped she would, matching Iqra’s cathartic burn, turning all her pain to ashes. Umm Salama cried instead. A gasping, snotty, hiccupping cry. And Iqra caught the sadness in her throat. That stone of loneliness rising back up her trachea.  Iqra didn’t say sorry, willing Umm Salama to turn this around, to find the fury again, to berate and redeem her. But she didn’t. The sisters both stood crying in the kitchen, unable to stop, hardly able to breathe, all their wet pain pooling on the floor. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Samantha Lamont Adams is a Black Milwaukeean, freshwater enthusiast, and Doctoral Candidate in English and Women’s & Gender Studies at the University of Michigan, currently completing a dissertation about literary and historical relationships between Black Americans and bodies of water beyond the Atlantic Ocean in the early 20th century. She previously studied Creative Writing and Gender & Women’s Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is ever interested in the material and figurative qualities of water and the generative collisions between the sacred and profane.  candy’s cameo [new york, 1975] Let’s face it. I am a marked woman, but not everybody knows my name. “Peaches” and “Brown Sugar,” “Sapphire” and “Earth Mother,” “Aunty,” “Granny,” God’s “Holy Fool,” a “Miss Ebony First,” or “Black Woman at the Podium”: I describe a locus of confounded identities, a meeting ground of investments and privations in the national treasury of rhetorical wealth. My country needs me, and if I were not here I would have to be invented [...] In order for me to speak a truer word concerning myself, I must strip down through layers of attenuated meanings, made an excess in time, over time, assigned by a particular historical order, and there await whatever marvels of my own inventiveness. —Hortense J. Spillers, “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: An American Grammar Book” (1987).  You are fantastical. —Candy Love (an actress of the Golden Age of Pornography), as Leona in The Erotic Dr. Jekyll  (1975) Yes,       yes,  every photograph of you was already taken before you stepped on set. despite this leaden american grammar in all its suffocating layers, you are coming. or so I hope. i cannot be vain and call this a project of recovery, for you have always been here, making love and rent  and kissing the beautiful face of your husband and laughing in a fake french accent, committing to the bit and crooning oh monsieur, fuck me please you have always been here on flickering film, frosted aquamarine eyeshadow, offwhite lace of the maid’s bonnet sliding down jetblack hair  your throat a tower gleaming in front of the gaffer your hand tugging at his hair guiding his tongue the stunning gap    between your teeth your hips rolling like water over his face you have always been here or perhaps you just arrived, walking onto set writhing atop low-pile pools of crimson and beige spilling just out of frame inventing yourself anew ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Unoma Azuah is a Nigerian writer and activist whose research and activism focus on LGBT rights and stories in Nigerian literature. She is the international-award-winning author of three books. photo by Jose Osorio Unoma Azuah teaches English at Wiregrass Georgia Tech. Valdosta, GA, USA. In 2011, she was listed as one of the top professors at small private colleges in the United States in Affordable/Private Colleges and Universities in the United States . Additionally, she is recognized by The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education under the topic, "Honors for Four Black Educators." Some of her collaborative works with organizations like the International Gay, Lesbian, and Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) and PEN America led to reports and book projects like “Nowhere to Turn: Blackmail and Extortion of LGBT People in Sub-Saharan Africa” and “Silenced Voices, Threatened Lives: The Impact of Nigeria’s Anti-LGBTI Law on Freedom of Expression.” Her latest work is entitled, Wedged Between Man and God: Queer West African Women’s stories . Some of her awards include the Aidoo-Snyder award, Urban Spectrum award, Flora Nwapa/ Association of Nigerian Authors award, Leonard Trawick award and the Hellman/Hammett Human Rights award. Her undergraduate degree in English is from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.  She has an MA in English from Cleveland State University, Cleveland, Ohio, and an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA. Postcards Western Sahara A parliament of vultures  surround the carcass of a camel. Wind-blown men on horses Cast a side glance at me The sandstorms on their heels tint the air  Dakar three faces the side with buzzing bees the side where balboa trees dwell and the side where splashes of sea waves taunt I was robbed at a place where zinc roofs touched the sun  Cape Town White height  sparkle Addicts, black, lingered around trash cans A woman with bird nests in her eyes smashed her metal bag on my face Figuring out why  took the length of the street: long Abuja for three months I lived in a hotel with my lover and her band To help her mount her music monument  The installation came crashing down on us. London She held the crown I wanted  She let me touch it I couldn’t take it I found love in this town, but lost. Beijing She was straight  But I showed her how to bend to Buddha Our tongues crashed through a worship song She spoke Mandarin I spoke Igbo We swallowed our tongues They couldn’t save us. Chicago The cold drains life Ice blocks are what I grind with my teeth I spend a lifetime seeking the sun I left life in a defrosting gadget Now, withered wings are far flung From these heights I have mounted new wings against the greying sky.  Ontario Blue blood,  blue hue,  the feel of cotton clouds: they know neither the sizzle of pain fried, nor the burn of bones broken.... Hurricane hallucinations:  Silence crashes through my glass door drops a seagull at my feet  where broken glasses lay sea waves gather   the gash on the door streams in sun beams  slants of light strangulating me. traps. me. the sea rises birds shrieking this water laps my face a dog and a tongue a gallon gulps the sea rises there are birds flapping their wings  Flailing arms I drop, deeper my prayers rise like  floating feathers  yet  Hens hum in the distance. THE INTERVIEW This interview was conducted between Unoma Azuah and Jae Nichelle on December 10, 2025. Thank you for sharing these incredible poems! “Postcards” includes so many different cities. As a frequent traveler, how do you find that your physical location shapes your writing style? Of course, new locations are new experiences. At such places, my senses are usually heightened, so I try to absorb everything about that location, from sounds to sights, food, temperature, and energies. Like a meal, it’s often fresh and sizzling. There are some instances, though, where the situation can feel sour or strange. For instance, a few years ago, I was at a local market in Qinghai Province, China, and the lady I was buying shawls from was so curious about my skin. I was taken aback. She asked to touch my arm. I guess she wanted to know if the black of my skin was like a soot that could rub off.  At first, I was offended. However, her eyes lit up with genuine curiosity. Encounters like this make me keep a record of my experiences, the people, and the places. It’s like taking photographs on trips. In this case, instead of a camera for pictures, I come away with poems or stories. So, yes, my physical location shapes my writing style because new places offer me new occasions to absorb the vigor of people and their idiosyncrasies. Traveling is enriching; it’s a fodder for creativity.  “Hurricane Hallucinations” ends with such an interesting turn. What is your philosophy for writing your endings, whether it’s poetry or fiction? Endings are very important to me when I write both Fiction or Poetry. Just like in relationships, the way it ends makes it easier for one to either heal or stay traumatized. Good closures in writing are vital. It’s like that lingering reverberation at the end of a great musical score. It leads you home. It completes the pleasure. It’s a climax. Everything else falls into place. It’s also a way for me to connect with my audience- for them to step into my shoes-to feel what I feel- and to know exactly why I feel the way I feel. Therefore, endings make the micro the macro: it’s about focusing on the small scale and then spanning out to the macro, the large scale. Hence, my philosophy of endings is that it’s imperative for my audience see the larger picture when they are done reading that piece of literature.  In a 2017 interview , you said you enjoy poetry the most out of all the genres. Is that still the case? And what are your rituals, if any, for sitting down to write a poem? That is still the case. Ironically, I write more of fiction and nonfiction these days. Poetry is still that mistress I see sporadically, and I am still discreet about the “affair.” Consequently, for me, poetry is like worshipping at an altar. It’s intense and intermittent. I actually have to wait for the muse to knock me off my butt to write it. As for rituals, I don’t think I have any. I don’t sit down and decide to write poems. It has to hit me like a bolt. A case in point is this: there was a time I was running late for a class I had to teach, but as I drove through rural Georgia at near dusk, I couldn’t resist pulling over to the shoulder of the road just to stare at how the rays of the sun glistened at the tips of leaves on a corn field. I had to get a pen and paper. Incidentally, the energy I soaked in before writing the poem had nothing to do with neither the sun nor the leaves.  This approach to writing poems very much goes against the saying, “Writing is 99 percent perspiration and 1 percent inspiration.” Therefore, the opposite is the case for me when it comes to writing poems. With fiction, though, I do have some rituals which start with my carrying the story around my head for weeks before I sit down and jot down major plots. I would usually sit in the evenings or at night, I am a night owl of sorts, creating and hashing out characters for a couple of hours, and returning to it every day or couple of days until the work is done.    Your work, from your acclaimed memoir Embracing My Shadow to your curated anthologies, has platformed lesbian stories, sometimes at great risk to your safety or the safety of others. How do you navigate having both vulnerability and protection when writing from such intimate places? I navigate both vulnerability and protection by being private about my locations, and I share very little to no information about my projects until they are done. I also find ways to disguise projects that may attract hostility, just like I did with the recent book tour of the Queer West African Women’s stories, Wedged Between Man and God . The unfortunate thing about that very significant event was that we couldn’t share the news in the media as the events were happening. That was heartbreaking because it could have attracted more people to come for “conversations” if I advertised it in the media. Nevertheless, we stayed on the side of caution by inviting only friends and allies, and then shared the news about the events after we completed them and were all safely home. Per antagonism, there have been a couple of instances where people spat at me in public and called me a disgrace. On those occasions, I was lucky have people with me who could serve as security assistants in case hostile situations spiral out of control. Still, it’s not all gloom and doom. A number of queer women, too, have recognized me in public and offered me hugs and handshakes and expressed their gratitude for what I do to make them feel “seen.”   Nigeria’s sociopolitical climate around sexuality has shaped much of your work. How do you see the landscape changing, and what impact has that had on queer storytelling since you began writing? There has been quite a bit of progress. There are more queer people who are “out” and vocal in their creative and advocacy work, especially the younger generations: millennials and Gen Z. This is very much unlike the 80’s and 90’s when I was an adolescent trying to navigate the rugged terrain of queerness. I felt so alone. There were no role models in that sense, and nothing in Nigerian literature that I could identify with, except for Wole Soyinka’s character, Joe Golder, in his novel, The Interpreters . But then, Joe is not just a “foreigner,” he is also not bestowed with the best fate. In fact, it felt as if Soyinka had a level of disdain for the character. And there was absolutely nothing about lesbians like me. I still remember the outrage that followed my first newspaper article in the 90’s about queer literature. Now, though, things are a bit better, especially when some of us can hide behind the screens of social media, share our stories, push for queer rights, and spread awareness about our lives. Consequently, the storytelling landscape in Nigeria is expanding. We have not gotten where I’d like us to be, though. Nonetheless, we’re building and pushing, one brick at a time.  When you came to the U.S. from Nigeria, what spaces or people did you find solace and support in? When I arrived in the US over two decades ago, I didn’t have a lot of options for spaces and people I could share a community with apart from my mentor, Leslye Huff, and her spouse, Amina; they gave me a great transition nest. Otherwise, I was mostly on my own. Then again, I was so overwhelmed with trying to settle into a graduate program at Cleveland State University, Ohio, that I barely had time to breathe, let alone seek or find friends. For example, I had to learn how to type, how to use a computer, and how to speak well enough to be understood. I also had to train my ears to understand what my professors and classmates were saying. When I did try to make friends, it was just obvious that most folks I met already had their clique of friends, so trying to be a part of those circles felt like crashing a party.  With time though, I made great friends, and we have maintained/sustained that friendship till date.                What’s a small joy that instantly uplifts you during hard times? The small joys that instantly uplift me during hard times and good times would include reading books, listening to disco and soul music from the 80’s and 90’s, engaging in stimulating conversations, sitting by the sea/ocean watching and listening to waves rise, crash and recede, taking long walks as birds chirp in the distance, laughter and still being able to enjoy delicious Nigerian meals. I also love being present in the moment and enjoying it with a heart of gratitude.                How can people support you right now? I would appreciate more literary engagements and spaces to share my works. I would also appreciate support for my works, particularly for people who are able to buy my books. Additionally, donations and grant opportunities for the Nigerian LGBTQ+ organizations I work with will go a long way. Name another Black writer people should know.  A couple of them come to mind: there is Itiola Jones, the author of Blood Mercy , and this book reimagines Cain and Abel as sisters who are in a traumatic relationship. The second writer is Safia Elhillo. Her work is noteworthy for its representation of black Muslim women and the black diaspora in America.   ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Click here to support Torch Literary Arts.

Allie Morgan (she/her) is a writer, director, and producer in Chicago, IL. She studied entertainment business at Los Angeles Film School and screenwriting at New York Film Academy.  She has written and directed numerous award-winning short films and a proof of concept, and recently started her own production, Muffy Film Productions, which focuses on platforming marginalized filmmakers. When she is not writing and directing her own projects, she also loves assistant directing and producing other people’s projects. She is passionate about telling stories for women, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community, and her ultimate goal is to put these underrepresented communities in front of and behind the camera in all of her films. POETRY BY DEAD MEN A black screen. Muffled noise and music in the background. NADIA (O.S.) You've got this, babe! You can do it! NAOMI (O.S.) I don't, I can't. NADIA (O.S.) You can, I promise. FADE IN: 1. INT. NADIA AND NAOMI'S LIVING ROOM - EARLY EVENING (DREAM SEQUENCE) The screen comes into focus. NADIA (late 20s-early 30s, with a distinct septum piercing and purple streak in her hair) sits behind NAOMI (late 20s-early 30s, with a nose ring to match Nadia's septum ring) in a small birthing pool. Meditation chants and music play from a speaker in the background. NAOMI Just pull her out of me! Knock me out! Anything! Nadia moves from behind Naomi so they're face-to-face. Nadia kneels in front of Naomi and takes her face in her hands. NADIA Look at me. You're the strongest woman I know. You are capable of anything you set your mind to. Nadia touches her forehead against Naomi's. NADIA (CONT'D) She's right there. Just a few more pushes and we'll have our baby with us. NAOMI (quietly) Okay. NADIA Remember, there's nothing to fear, but- NAOMI Fear itself. (she takes a deep breath) I have to push. Fade to black. A baby cries off screen. 2. INT. NADIA AND NAOMI'S BEDROOM - LATER THAT NIGHT (DREAM SEQUENCE) The room is lit exclusively with candles. Quiet music plays in the distance. Naomi lies in bed covered only in a sheet. She cradles and nurses the newborn in her arms. Small footsteps come padding down the hallway and into the room. SIENNA (6) enters the room timidly. SIENNA Mama? NAOMI Come meet your sister, baby. Sienna walks over to the bed and crawls in next to Naomi. Naomi puts her free arm around her. SIENNA What's her name? NAOMI Sayrah. SIENNA (slowly) Sie-ruh. Sienna grabs Sayrah's foot and tickles it gently. SIENNA (CONT'D) Hi, Sayrah. I'm your sister. (after a beat) Do you think she knows me? From when I talked to her in your belly? NAOMI Definitely. SIENNA Do you think she remembers all of the poems we read to her? NAOMI (she laughs) Maybe. SIENNA I like her. NAOMI I like her too. Naomi looks back and forth between Sienna and Sayrah. NAOMI (CONT'D) You're still my girl, you know that right? SIENNA Mhm. NAOMI Both of you. Forever. Sienna places a kiss on Sayrah's head and then on Naomi's cheek. SIENNA Mama? NAOMI Hm? SIENNA Did it hurt? NAOMI What? SIENNA To have Sayrah. You said before that sometimes it hurts mama's to have babies. NAOMI A little. But I'd do it all over again. (after a beat) All the pain in the world, I'd do it over and over again if it meant you two could be mine forever. 3. INT. NADIA AND NAOMI'S KITCHEN - MORNING (DREAM SEQUENCE) Nadia stands at the kitchen island in a white t-shirt and black boy shorts. She pours a cup of coffee and sprinkles cinnamon into a mug that says "best mama ever". Naomi enters with Sayrah strapped to her chest. She grabs Nadia's waist from behind. NAOMI Coffee? NADIA Mhm. NAOMI Cinnamon? NADIA You know it. NAOMI I am madly in love with you, you know that? NADIA The feeling is mutual, my love. Naomi sits at the chair. She takes a sip of her coffee. Her eyes roam up and down Nadia's body. NAOMI This with a view? What else could a girl ask for? NADIA That, with a view, plus I'll read to you and the little one while you nap. NAOMI I am going to marry you all over again. 4. EXT. LOCAL PARK - AFTERNOON (DREAM SEQUENCE) Sienna runs around on the playground with friends. Nadia and Naomi sit on a nearby bench with Sayrah in the stroller. Naomi's free hand is on Nadia's thigh and her other hand holds a coffee. Sayrah giggles from her seat. NAOMI What's so funny, munchkin? NADIA You want some of mama's coffee, don't you? Naomi leans the cup toward Sayrah playfully. Sayrah giggles and swats at the straw. NAOMI Maybe when you're a little older. And then mama will take you on coffee dates every Saturday. Sienna climbs to the top of the play structure. SIENNA Mommy, mama! Look! Sienna hangs her legs from the top of the structure, then twists herself around the equipment and jumps to the ground. NADIA Baby, please be careful! SIENNA I am, mommy! promise! Sienna stumbles through the woodchips and runs toward Nadia and Naomi. She grabs Naomi's hand and pulls her off the bench. SIENNA (CONT'D) Mama, come here! I wanna show you something! NAOMI Where are we going, baby? SIENNA It'll be really quick, promise! DISSOLVE TO: 5. EXT. FOREST BEHIND THE PARK - AFTERNOON CONT. (DREAM SEQUENCE) Sienna pulls Naomi's hand and tugs her toward the wooded area. Sienna begins to run faster. Naomi lags behind her. NAOMI Sienna, slow down! Where are we going? Sienna doesn't respond. She keeps tugging Naomi as they get further into the woods. It starts to become darker. Sienna lets go of Naomi's hand. She continues running until she disappears out of sight. NAOMI (CONT'D) Sienna? SIENNA! CUT TO: 6. EXT. NADIA AND NAOMI'S HOUSE - NIGHT (FLASHBACK) Police drag Naomi out of her house in handcuffs. Naomi is covered in blood and tears and snot stains her face. NAOMI SIENNA! SIENNA! SIENNA MAMA! COME BACK! NAOMI SIENNA, GO INSIDE! NADIA, TAKE HER INSIDE! Nadia tries to grab Sienna and Sienna wrestles with her in the doorway. SIENNA Mama! Mama don't leave me! Please! NAOMI Sienna, I love you. Don't ever forget that! The police shove Naomi into the back of the car. Naomi sobs and puts her hand to the window as they drive away. Sienna falls to her knees at the door and Nadia stands behind her. CUT TO: 7. INT. THERAPIST'S OFFICE - DAY (PRESENT DAY) DR. WRIGHT (40s, very serious demeanor) sits at her desk. Naomi sits across from her in a chair. Her eyes have heavy dark circles around them, both of her wrists are bandaged, and her white t-shirt barely fits over her now eight-month bump. DR. WRIGHT And then what? Naomi doesn't respond. DR. WRIGHT (CONT'D) Naomi? NAOMI (distant) Hm? DR. WRIGHT You said Sienna runs off into the forest, and then what? NAOMI When can I see Sienna? DR. WRIGHT Naomi, what happens after Sienna runs into the forest in your dream? NAOMI I wanna see Sienna. Why can't I see Sienna? DR. WRIGHT Naomi- NAOMI Sienna should be with me. Naomi protectively places her hand over her belly. NAOMI (CONT'D) Both of them should be able to stay with me. DR. WRIGHT Naomi, please fo- NAOMI (hysterical) LET ME SEE SIENNA. WHY WON'T YOU LET ME SEE MY DAUGHTER? WHY ARE YOU KEEPING HER AWAY FROM ME? WHY ARE YOU TAKING THEM BOTH AWAY FROM ME? Dr. Wright pushes the emergency call button next to her desk. Within seconds, two medical personnel enter the room and grab Naomi by both of her arms. Naomi flails wildly as they drag her out of the room. Her screams echo down the hallway. 8. INT./EXT. VARIOUS - MONTAGE -- Naomi, Nadia, and Sienna sing together in the car -- Sienna plays dress up in a green dress -- Naomi and Nadia tell Sienna they're pregnant -- Sienna reads poetry to Naomi's belly -- Sienna and Sayrah play together in the backyard SIENNA (V.O.) Mama, if you're reading this, that means today is your birthday. This is my fourth birthday without you and each year I worry I will forget what your birthdays with you are like. Mommy took us on a road trip, and we're wearing the matching green dresses you like so much. We also stopped to get coffees, just the way you like them. Sayrah is so big now and she loves to read and write. I think she gets that from you. She doesn't know you, but I show her pictures of you every day. I hope one day you will be able to meet her. I hope we are still your girls. I hope we always will be. FADE TO BLACK. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Chennelle Channer is a Jamaican-born poet and writer. She immigrated to America in her early childhood and was raised between the restless hum of Brooklyn and the measured cadence of South Carolina. Her Caribbean roots shape the rhythm and voice of her storytelling and Jamaica remains the place where she feels most at home.  She earned her B.A. in English with a concentration in creative writing from SUNY Binghamton and is currently pursuing a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies at Dartmouth College. Her poetry explores immigration, language, womanhood, and Black familial structures, blending lyric intensity with narrative storytelling. Her work has appeared in Bloodroot Lit. , Clamantis , and Frontier Poetry , where she was named a finalist in the 2024 Open Contest. Beyond the page, she finds inspiration in the subtle patterns of daily life. She enjoys slow mornings, often starting the day with a cup of tea in silence. She cherishes the quiet of the early morning, before the world fully wakes and the day feels unclaimed. Through her work, she hopes readers feel seen, recognized, understood, and valued. GIRLHOOD IN AN AGE OF SUPERWOMEN I think a backseat is necessary now. I’m tired of holding my tongue like chewing the words makes me any less starved. I cried all last night cuz they cut my lights. Tired, I’ve been telling everyone I’m tired. Easier than explaining how the scar on my inner thigh is my testimony. I think a quick death is necessary now. I was warned once of the damage a copper plated slug does. Nothing said of all the ways a bible splits you open. My body, like the inside of an aloe leaf still tender from the lack of loving. I wear my gold cross over my white tee to remind helicopters to pass over. I think a clean slate is necessary now. I’ve got too many afflictions that intersect like the Brooklyn streets that still haunt me. I remember the first time I said it was the last time I’d let a man hit me. Turned a corner into newer, rougher hands. Swallowed whole all the bottles in my bathroom cabinet and somehow survived. I’ve been told that’s grace, I should be grateful. But I’m still bitter, and steeping in it. How can I be soft when I’m troubled and I don’t look like anyone will remember the weight of my name. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Idza Luhumyo was born in Mombasa, Kenya. She studied law at the University of Nairobi, earned an MA in Comparative Literature at SOAS--University of London, and an MFA in Creative Writing from Texas State University.  Her writing has appeared in various publications, including Transition Magazine ,  African Arguments , the  Masters Review , and the  Porter House Review . Her short story, "Five Years Next Sunday," was awarded the 2021 Short Story Day Africa Prize and the 2022 Caine Prize for African Writing. Other awards include the Margaret Busby New Daughters of Africa Award and the Civitella Ranieri Writing Fellowship. She currently lives and works in Austin, TX. But That's a Long, Long Time Ago There's something calming about being stuck in an international airport, for hours, watching the world go by as you remain still, waiting to hear a voice call out your flight number. You're at peace, serene even, in spite of the uncomfortable seats on which you can only sleep in fits and starts. In spite of the dubious Wi-Fi that you know you shouldn't trust but to which you connect anyway. In spite of the fact that anytime you have to use the bathroom, you have to work out the complicated math of lining the toilet seat with tissue paper and then arranging yourself over it as you try to hold on to your carry-on luggage. You are on your way to a short story festival in Cork, the second-largest city in Ireland. You set out from San Marcos—the small, charming city in Central Texas that houses the Creative Writing program in which you are enrolled. You are taking this trip because, in a lucky sequence of events, which you suppose is how these things tend to go, a short story you wrote many years ago won a major prize. The journey to Cork is long, and it has been a long time coming. During the visa application process, you had to teach yourself how to trust American couriers with your passport and not think of the many ways everything could go very wrong. Once, things do in fact go wrong: when your passport with the visa stamp is returned, someone in the leasing office makes a mistake. Yes, it was delivered to the office, they say to you. But for the life of them, they cannot remember to what apartment they sent it. There is a moment there where you forget how to breathe. The person you are speaking to is chirpy and casual, typing away on the keyboard as she tells you, coolly, that your passport—this bright blue booklet of a document without which you cannot travel, or prove your right to be in the USA—is lost. Would you like to give it a day or so, she asks, see whether anything comes up? She is a sweetheart, really, the person saying these things to you, probably a Zoomer if her 90s-inspired outfit is anything to go by. She is the company's newest employee, one of those people who have a frantic aura about them: always rushing about, chewing fast, typing fast, talking fast, as if they had come to the world late, and were trying to play catch-up. Usually, when you come to the leasing office for your packages, you find her excitability charming, endearing. But as she finally looks away from her computer and tells you to go to your apartment and wait for your passport to magically appear, you pity her for the wrath you’re about to unleash. You tell her, in the quietest voice you can manage, that you will do no such thing. The clipped tone works: in less than an hour, your passport is found. # Cork is exactly how you expected an Irish city to be from the Irish novels you've previously devoured. Even though you've come to appreciate how big cities give you an anonymity that you disappear into, you're a small-town girl and find yourself charmed by how this rustic city seems to close in on itself, as if its buildings are huddling towards each other, keeping each other warm. Back home, in the artist circles in which you ran in your twenties, Ireland has always been looked on kindly because it shares with Kenya a brutal British colonial history. Your hosts are kind. Everything goes as planned: the taxi picking you from the airport; the drive through the rustic route to the hotel; the warm reception the next morning. At first, the restrained demeanour of the festival organizers is an adjustment: in the past year or so that you've been in America, you've gotten used to a certain fussiness, an outward friendliness that seems obligatory. But here, the pleasantness is at a remove, and people are more than happy to ease into silence when they run out of things to say. It is glorious. Maybe this is why you trust it. And even when the weather drops to single digits and you realize you didn't carry enough warm clothes, something inside of you thaws. # On the day of your reading, you stand in front of Irish writers and literary enthusiasts and read a story that pulls no punches in its critique of people who look like them. After your reading, there is applause. The sound of this prolonged applause will return to your mind when, months after the Cork trip, when back home in Nairobi for the Christmas break, someone at a literary gathering will remark that the African stories most likely to win literary prizes are those that criticize the very people who award them. But on that day, after you read your story, an elderly white woman walks up to you outside the auditorium and wraps you in a hug. You catch a whiff of Chanel No. 5 you usually scoff at, but which you start to like from then on. She calls you brave. Clutching your scarves and jackets, you walk down a cobbled path, and she tells you, a little haltingly, that she is a librarian and that she, too, is thinking of publishing some things she's jotted down throughout the years. She tells you that your bravery has inspired her to return to her writing. You hear yourself trotting out the writing advice you've heard throughout the years and which you, yourself, could use. You wonder what business you have offering writing advice to someone who's more than double your age and who, all her life, has worked with, and around, books. When you tell her you will be flying out in a couple of days, it is with a disappointed look that she bids you goodbye, but not before she points out, with barely-concealed urgency, the bookshops and coffee shops to visit before you leave. When you mention record shops, she points one out. Unbeknownst to her, the owner of the record shop is married to a Kenyan woman, and when you go down the stairs and tumble into this underground haven of sonic delight, you spend a lovely hour going on and on about 80s African music with someone whose enthusiasm belies the fact that he has never visited the continent. # Now that your reading is done, you allow yourself to have fun. You wonder if it's because your accent doesn't stand out as much, and that you spend as much time deciphering the Irish brogue as other writers try to understand your Kenyan English. You all have choice words about the British Empire, imperialism, the war in Ukraine. You redeem your drink tokens alongside the other writers and sit around a table and talk. In a corner of the room, a folk musician sits with a guitar, scoring the night with sparse chords about loneliness, lost love. You feel right at home in this famous brand of Irish sentimentality. A few writers sit away from the laughing group and brood. They sip and close their eyes. It's cold outside, but you're all sweating, taking off scarves and jackets and sweaters the more you laugh. You talk about writing rituals, Prince Charles III, Sally Rooney, Northern Ireland, Derry Girls, Trinity College, and, briefly, HBO's Succession when one of the writers is delighted you know how to pronounce Siobhan. You have your very first crush on a white man. Of course, he had to be Irish, your friend replies with a laughing emoji when you text her. # During mealtimes at the hotel, you’ve taken to looking for the tables that are tucked far away. You want to look at your phone and scroll away in chatter-free bliss. Some of the other writers, bless them, seem to notice and keep away, nodding and smiling every time your eyes meet. One morning at breakfast, you realize you've not spotted any other black person at the hotel. You feel guilty for only noticing this on the last day. But the guilt gives way to something like relief. Yes, you're the only black person at the hotel. Yes, you're the only black person at the festival. But contrary to how you often feel in America, you don't have the sensation of sticking out, you don't feel that a simple conversation will out you for being a different sort of black person altogether. # On the last day of the festival, after the first session of readings, you rush back to the hotel to grab dinner. The dining room is sparsely occupied, and most of the diners are elderly. The paneled walls and the perfectly set tables bring to mind a British pomposity that makes you smile. The time difference between Cork and Nairobi is only two hours. This makes it easier to keep up with Kenyan Twitter and Instagram in real time compared to when you're in America. You haven't been on social media all day. The idea is to find a table where you can scroll away in quiet bliss. You find one at the far end. You sit with your back to the room. The table has used utensils from the previous diners. On the top-right corner of the room, a TV shows a football game. Directly under the TV, a table with an elderly couple, sipping what appears to be the last of their drinks. You keep your head down, waiting for the maître d' to greet you and take your order. You've been lost in your phone for a while when you feel a shift in the air. You look over to the couple on your right. They keep sending looks towards you, and you keep looking back surreptitiously. At one point, you and the woman look at each other at the same time and send each other a smile. You are reassured. You return to your phone. Someone on your Instagram stories is giving a blow-by-blow account of a developing story about a Kenyan socialite. You're chuckling, you’re ignoring emails, you’re waiting to get dinner. After the reading, you hope you and the other writers will sample a little of the Cork nightlife. You even look forward to stealing a few moments with your crush. Your attention is drawn to your right again. Now, there are three: one of the waitresses has joined them. They are all facing your table. The waitress nods as the woman talks. On the older woman's face is a look you've seen often on your own mother's when she's giving someone a good scolding. You take out your earphones. The young woman—she couldn't be a day older than eighteen years—walks over to you, her cheeks flushed. You look over to the couple and they are shaking their heads, frowning. "Just unacceptable," the man says, still shaking his head. His voice attracts the attention of the other diners, and now looks are being directed towards you. The young woman, now appearing even younger than you'd thought her to be, starts to clear your table. You can feel the other diners' eyes. She is apologizing. Her eyes are watery. You feel a lump growing in your throat. You pinch the underside of your right arm, an old trick pilfered from a TV show, to forestall the tears you feel coming. You're not sure who you resent more: the restaurant staff who took too long to clear your table and get your order, or the elderly couple who pointed out the slight and turned you into a thing to be pitied. The waitress apologizes again. "Hey, it's okay," you hear yourself say. She nods rapidly, a smile on her face. Then, once she's stacked the utensils on her arms, she asks in a chirpy voice: "Did one of us seat you here?" The shift from the teary eyes to chirpiness is remarkable. "No," you say to her, haltingly. "I just came and sat here."  "I'm really sorry, I didn't see you, you had your back turned..." You tell her it's completely okay. That you only sat there because you wanted some privacy. It turns out you'd been waiting for half an hour. She takes your order. Your drink comes soon after she leaves. And then a couple of minutes after that, another server rushes to you with your plate of salmon, mashed potatoes, and a few celery sticks. You avoid looking at the couple on your right. You down the drink and then tackle the fish. The server returns to ask how you're finding the meal. You have about twenty minutes before the reading, so you ask for a cocktail. As you wait, the couple gets up. They walk to your table. "You had been waiting for too long on a dirty table," the woman says, as if you had only just come to the scene yourself. "We just couldn't sit there and watch that happen to you." You nod and smile, wishing that you had your cocktail already. Then the man, in a quiet conversational tone, tells you that they are English tourists. That he had long known of his Irish ancestry and that they were finally taking this trip to see some of his ancestors' burial grounds. This moves you. You feel bad about being previously annoyed. "And where are you from?" the woman asks you.  "Kenya,” you say. "Oh," she exclaims, clutching her husband's arm. She starts to laugh. "She grew up in Kenya," the man explains, chuckling.  The woman shakes her head slowly, as if she can’t believe the sheer coincidence of it all. "But that's before we got married," the man continues, taking on the role of his wife's interpreter. "She's still got some family there. Her father was sent there as an administrator with the British government. The 40s, it may have been? But that's a long, long time ago, I'm sure you were not born." "Oh no," you say, chuckling. "Kenya wasn't even a country then." He's laughing. You're laughing. You're all laughing. Out of the corner of your eye, you see the waitress from before, going to the kitchen with a stack of plates on her arm. You get up from the table. You've decided to give up on the cocktail. In a single file, the three of you walk to the cashier. And there you all stand, waiting to settle your bills. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Nina Oteria is a poet, artist, and former educator from Raleigh, North Carolina. Her poetry has been published in Southern Cultures , Apogee ,  Scalawag Magazine , and elsewhere. She performs in Durham, Raleigh, and Chapel Hill based poetry reading series'. Nina was a featured performer at NC State’s Gregg Museum of Art and Design. She is one of the founding poets of the Corcoran Poetry Wall mural installation in Durham, NC. Nina uses poetry and art as a means to heal herself and her community, upholding the Black storytelling tradition. Nina’s co-written manuscript, A Matter of Radical Pushback: Political TheoPoetics of the Black Imagination , is forthcoming from Wipf and Stock Publishers. Nina’s chapters in this manuscript illuminate the importance of “slow theology” for Black artists and teachers, combining poetry, academic writing, and theology, and describing artmaking as a spiritual practice. Nina holds an MFA in Writing from Pratt Institute and a BA in Religious Studies from Wake Forest University. Nina facilitates Sweetgum Workshop, a healing and creative arts ministry. She is a former English and Creative Writing teacher at Raleigh Charter High School. Numerical “We’re spending life loving it exclusively because we couldn’t change the world.” Etel Adnan sea and fog 6. A car is a function of capitalism. We must move faster so that numbers may circulate. Money isn’t real, it's a flow of characters on screens. But if you ignore the numbers, the police will soon show up at your door. 2. The blue evening touches me on Sunday. I’m thinking about blue things before I get in my car tomorrow and ride as fast as a certain number to get to my desk at another number then pay close attention to the numbers on the small, inaccurate moon bound to my right wrist. (I put away the number screen because it makes me dizzy.) 5. I ask God about time. God points to the moon, to the sunrise and 300 starlings snatching my frosty breath from my throat as they fly. I ask God about time and God says my veins are blue. God won’t tell me how many veins I have, even though I ask. Numbers are most important to everyone except God. 3. You can’t have any food or medicine unless you first pledge allegiance to imaginary numbers. I wanted to have imaginary friends when I was younger; I kept forgetting to imagine them. I was given a blue betta fish instead. I took care of his small body. My Dad kept his tank clean and he lived long for someone completely alone and in captivity. When he died I was jumping rope. 1. Sunday morning I woke up to a minor tornado. Recently I dreamed of a cheetah and my childhood cheetah print backpack, never tempted to count the spots. In the tornado I felt irritated at a man and I thought it was true. I realized I was just tired. My body fluctuates within the month’s numbers, the month’s numbers which stay the same. In the dream the cheetah looked at me intently, not skittish, as if it wanted to tell me something. Throughout the day I wonder what numbers are on the screens when I can’t see them. 8. I ask my body for information on what is happening around me apart from my senses. My body says, “What’s the point? All you listen to is numbers. You’re my imaginary friend. You’re my pet rock.” I don’t know how to respond to that so I check the time, the number in the blue dusk. 3 more hours till I pull the plug on my body’s ruminations. I can’t understand most of her poetry. 9. I ask God about poetry and God says veins, the ocean, the dirt (meaning earth). The blue evening of the world’s very first day. In prayer I am under all those layers. Numbers come apart at their angles like chairs with broken legs. God winks and I start to laugh uncontrollably. When I open my eyes I see my 1st gray hair in the mirror. Numbers are distracting. I walk towards the car so that I may begin to circulate like change. It takes focus to see what’s real in this rain. 4. The academy whipped me up into a frenzy of negativity, a cloud of numbers, a hailstorm of signifiers used to make the same general proposition. Now I am moving from blue’s opposite into blue. My veins decrease/increase their circulation. I am in no hurry. I don’t want to talk to anymore number people because there are still many questions I have to ask God. God always makes me laugh even in the midst of captivity, tornadoes, and my brain, my pet rock. 7. Money is a car. The self a character on a screen, a small inaccurate moon. I am a wing in no hurry. Numbers, when rotated, dissected, and collaged, resemble the flowers of poetry, which are the meanings of sunlight and blueness. This is not just my opinion, this is really what God told me. So all is not lost. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Fabienne Josaphat is the author of the novel  Kingdom of No Tomorrow (Algonquin), winner of the 2023 PEN Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction. photo by Pedro Wazzan Fabienne Josaphat is the author of the novel  Kingdom of No Tomorrow (Algonquin), winner of the 2023 PEN Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction, and longlisted for the 2025 Aspen Words Literary Prize. The New York Times calls it "Muscular, searing . .  . a novel for our times." Pulitzer-Prize winner Barbara Kingsolver says, "Kingdom of No Tomorrow will bring the fierce vision of the Black Panthers to new generations of readers, adding some stunning context to the modern Black Lives Matter movement." Of her first novel,  Dancing in the Baron’s Shadow , Edwidge Danticat said, “it is an irresistible read about the nature of good and evil, terror and injustice, and ultimately triumph and love.” In addition to fiction, Josaphat writes non-fiction and poetry, as well as screenplays. Her work has been featured in The African American Review , The Washington Post , Teen Vogue , The Master’s Review , The Caribbean Writer , Grist Journal, and more.  Kingdom of No Tomorrow (an excerpt) Michael Haywood was in his room, sitting up in bed. He looked frail. Beyond the yellow tint in his eyes and skin, Nettie saw the glow of brown eyes, and a face that would light up any midnight sky when it wasn’t contorting in pain. “Sometimes, I feel alright,” he muttered. “I do my chores, I go to school. But sometimes, I feel like I can’t breathe.” “Do you feel pain sometimes?” Nettie asked. “In your extremities? Fingers? Toes?” “Yes ma’am,” the boy said. “It’s how we knew I was sick.” Nettie sat on the edge of his bed. Mrs. Haywood stood by the door, watching. The room was dark, too, and Nettie was thankful for the table lamp that glowed enough to let her see what she was writing, checking off boxes. Michael had gotten screened with Dr. Johnson, who had immediately referred him to a hematologist. He was on medication, but lately, it wasn’t helping. Mrs. Haywood lowered her voice as if she didn’t want Michael to hear. “Since Charles died—my husband—things just became more difficult, financially. Hematologists are expensive . . .” Nettie could feel her eyes on her, perhaps trying to read her notes. “Do you know what a blood transfusion goes for at the hospital? You seem so young.” The orange glow from the table lamp illuminated Nettie’s face, and she felt her cheeks heat up. Mrs. Haywood was scrutinizing her features, judging her. Would her actual age diminish her authority here? Did this mean she couldn’t work or help in any way? She was prepared to argue for herself, she supposed. She’d had to argue this with her aunt many times. Tante Mado always pleaded that a pretty girl like her should always work her charms to get what she wanted. “You have the bone structure of a goddess,” Tante Mado would say, holding her face up in the light to see her angles. “You look like your mother. You could pose for magazines, you know.” No, this would not do. This, what she was doing here, tucking her pen and clipboard away, this had more meaning. If she couldn’t do this, then what point was there in even living? “How old are you?” Mrs. Haywood asked. Nettie looked in her eyes and smiled. “Twenty.” “That’s too young to be a doctor.” Nettie explained that she wasn’t yet, that this was basic practice. Nettie and Clia visited families in housing developments, apartments, and mostly projects in the flats bearing the names of their developers in the inner arteries of Oakland. All the apartments were the more or less same in layout and in squalor. In one home, Nettie was forced to sit in a corner of the kitchen with her feet up to avoid mice from running over her. She quickly learned the price of poverty here in Oakland, and in America, by observing in each of those visits the lack of nutrition in sick patients’ diets, the water that ran rust red from the tap, the small roaches crawling up the cupboards. How could people be expected to respond to treatment or heal, even, when they didn’t have any real food in their refrigerator? It puzzled her that this was passing as acceptable in a country so rich and plentiful. It felt absurd, as if somehow the poor were not deserving. There was a lie here, a lie between the fabric of the two worlds. It didn’t sit right. “Still, it gives me hope that you’re here. Sometimes I think about the world out there and how much it is all burning up in brimstone and fire, and sure enough, it’s always the young people like you who make me believe . . .” They walked out of Michael’s room and closed the door. The hallway was quiet enough that Nettie could hear every creak of wooden planks beneath her feet. Michael needed transfusions, and it enraged her that money was what stood in the way, but she clenched her jaw. What could she do about that? “I will talk to Dr. Johnson about it,” Nettie said. “You’re not alone, Mrs. Haywood.” Violet was sitting on the stairs with her doll between her legs. She was pretending to brush and comb her hair. Nettie smiled as they walked past her, but again, Violet didn’t return the smile. No one in this house truly laughed, Nettie thought. It hurt to see such dreariness in children. Clia was in the living room working on her report but put her pen down when Nettie walked in. “How is he?” Clia asked. “He is in pain,” Nettie said. “Medicated, but he may need a transfusion.” Clia went to the window and stared out through the glass panes. The afternoon was drawing to an end, but the sky was still illuminated. There was no wind, and the palm trees were still, as if etched permanently against the sky. “We can discuss later,” Clia said, cutting her off. “Someone is here.” There was a man coming up the driveway on foot. Nettie and Mrs. Haywood had gone to the window to see who it was. “Can I get the door, Mrs. Haywood? This is the man who came to help.” Mrs. Haywood hesitated. “Help? How do you mean?” “Let me introduce you to him,” Clia said. “You can decide for yourself if you want his help or not. I think you will.” There was a knock at the door. Nettie stood next to Mrs. Haywood, her palms clammy. She cast a glance up the stairs. Violet was still sitting there, her eyes fixed on the entrance. Clia was talking to the visitor, the door open, and they could only hear his voice, a low baritone, smooth, whispering to Clia before she whispered back. “Please come in . . .” Clia stepped into the living room, a tall figure trailing behind her. Nettie watched him stand there in a military stance, shoulders squared, feet planted firmly on the ground. Suddenly, everything took a more distinct shape before her eyes. She understood. The man looked at each of them in the eye. He looked to be no older than twenty-five. And what distressed her the most was how handsome he was. It wasn’t something in the face, but it was in the way he carried himself. There was authority in his step and in his voice, and Nettie studied his clothes. They were impeccable. He was wearing slacks, and a buttoned-up shirt, and a black bomber jacket in black leather. His shoes were shiny, like his hair, which was thick and black, like a plume of smoke, and it served as the perfect perch for a magnificent black beret, cocked to the right. “This here is my comrade, Melvin,” Clia said. “We’re in the same cadre. This is Mrs. Haywood, this is her house. And this here is my Sista Nettie.” Sista . This was what had sparked the fire between them. The word sista  had lured Nettie into the basements of the college, and the study halls, in meetings with members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Congress for Racial Equality. That word had bonded the two over class projects, visits to each other’s homes, and soon Clia was helping Nettie obtain a job in the same clinic where she worked. Clia was a sista to her, but obviously to so many others who knew to show up when she called. When Melvin nodded toward her, Nettie understood that this was who Clia had called. One of those brothas. A militant. Someone who didn’t come here to play games. Melvin reached out and shook Mrs. Haywood’s hand. He set something down on the sofa, a large black duffel bag Nettie hadn’t noticed before. Clia explained what Mrs. Haywood told them, and then finally Mrs. Haywood cleared her throat and went on about everything. About moving into the house two years ago, about the harassment that ensued. They were the only Black family on the block. They weren’t wanted. The homeowner’s association left her out of meetings and correspondence, at first, but lately, things had escalated to vandalism, threats in her mailbox. As she talked, Melvin moved around the living room. He peeked through windows, observed where the projectile had been thrown into her window. He looked out the kitchen windows, too, ascertaining their surroundings. The more she studied him, the older he seemed to her. She noticed a mustache over his upper lip and the sideburns to match, gracefully hugging his jawline. When he moved past her to go to another window, she smelled his fragrance and it was pure soap and leather. “I already talked to the police about this,” Mrs. Haywood said, suddenly exhausted. “They said it was just kids . . .” Melvin nodded. This time, he relaxed his stance and proceeded to remove what Nettie hadn’t noticed before. Gloves. It wasn’t cold out there, but she surmised he wore driving gloves, and it added a certain flair to his look. “At first, it was always at night . . . It’s always people who seem to live here; some of them are on the neighborhood association board. Now they come in larger numbers, in broad daylight, in the front of the house, in the back, throwing things into the yard, yelling things at us, like . . .” Mrs. Haywood stumbled, looking for words. Melvin waited for her to finish, but she suddenly looked into his eyes and they stared at each other quietly until he joined his hands behind his back. “Got tired of calling the police after a while,” she said. “They don’t give a damn. Don’t even come when you call, and when you don’t call they come and tell you to make things easier on yourself, and just move out—” Melvin stepped away again and this time paused by the piano, looking at the photographs on the top board. In one large frame, a veiled Mrs. Haywood clung to the arm of a handsome man with a mustache, in a white suit and bowtie, both of them cutting into a white cake. He glanced at Mrs. Haywood over his shoulder. “You call pigs to your home and they won’t come, because they’re too busy throwing bricks through your window.” Mrs. Haywood froze as Melvin moved a small figurine on top of the piano, pushing it away from the edge as if to protect it from falling. “It’s just a tactic, is what that is,” he said. “No different from the Klan.” “You sure know a lot about tactics . . .” Nettie was thinking the same thing as Mrs. Haywood appraised Melvin. “Where do you come from?” “Chicago,” Melvin said. “But I volunteered down in Jackson, Miss. Freedom rides.” Nettie watched Mrs. Haywood breathe in and finally surrender with a sigh. She saw the woman’s eyes go to the piano and the bench, where the glass had probably shattered, and her daughter probably cried, the sharp notes breaking the peace of this house. “Well? What do you think we should do?” “I have to report back to headquarters,” Melvin said. “Let them decide how to—” “I already did that,” Clia said. “They sent you.” “I dig it.” He looked at Clia directly in the eyes, visibly unpleased with the interruption. “All the same, we have rules. We’ll need backup.” “Why can’t you just sit tight here yourself?” Clia shouted. “And why call for backup when we’re standing right here?” Nettie leaned in to Clia, hoping to catch her attention and remind her she didn’t want to be involved. Especially if there was a potential for violence. But Clia was already balling her fists. “I mean, you can trust a woman to handle a gun, can’t you, Brother?” The way she emphasized “Brother” made Melvin square his shoulders, squint his eyes in annoyance. “Are you carrying?” Melvin asked. “If I did, I wouldn’t call you for backup,” Clia said. Nettie had never met a woman as bold and strong as Clia. “I don’t have time for jive.” Melvin sucked his teeth and turned to Mrs. Haywood. “Where’s your phone, Mrs. Haywood?” “Why don’t you give me one and see how I handle myself?” Clia said, her head bobbing defiantly. “Or are you just—” Something crashed against the window. Mrs. Haywood let out a yelp, but it was the sharp scream of a child that jolted Nettie out of her skin. Violet was still on that step upstairs, shrieking. Glass shattered again, the sound this time coming from the back window. “The hell?” Clia muttered, finding Nettie’s hand and squeezing it. Mrs. Haywood ran upstairs to the children, her footsteps heavy. She was muttering something inaudible; Nettie thought a prayer. Only Melvin stood there in the shadows of the living room, unflinching. Outside, there was a revving of engines. Nettie instinctively retreated with Clia against a wall, her heart pounding. She wanted to plug her ears, make the rumble and the shouting vanish. There were voices rising now above the roar of car engines, clearly shouting intolerable obscenities. “We told you to get out of our neighborhood! We don’t want your kind around here!” Clia cursed under her breath, and Nettie held hers. Her eyes were fixed on Melvin, his silhouette moving in slow motion toward the window. He lifted a corner of the curtain, peeked outside. “Watch out!” Mrs. Haywood hollered. They were throwing projectiles at the house now, screaming and shouting, and Clia’s nails dug into Nettie’s arm, pulling her closer as if to hold her, protect her. Nettie watched Melvin come away from the window with disconcerting calm. He went to the couch and unzipped the black duffel bag, reached inside. An electrical surge ran through her as he pulled out the barrel of what she recognized, in the darkness, as a shotgun, fully assembled. Something flew in through the window and crashed against the photographs on the piano. They fell, more glass shattering, revealing Mrs. Haywood’s younger self grinning next to her husband as they sliced their wedding cake. Nettie’s blood boiled as she saw a large rock dent the shiny surface of the piano. Something inside her snapped. She reached for the rock without a thought, cupped it in her own palm as she launched it like a grenade out the window, hoping to hurt whoever threw it in the first place. Still, she didn’t throw it far out enough. Melvin pumped the shotgun once. The click sent a chill down Nettie’s spine, but she suddenly realized the sight of the weapon made her less afraid. Something about its presence, the assurance of its effectiveness, as well as Melvin’s proximity, made her hopeful. He pulled out a handgun from his jacket and walked over to them and looked at Clia, and then Nettie. Then, at Clia again. Clia quickly took the pistol from him, inspected the chamber. It was fully loaded. She cocked it. “You watch the back door,” Melvin said. “Any motherfucker comes busting through it, you shoot’em dead, you dig? Don’t ask questions. Just kill’em.” “Right on,” Clia nodded, gleeful. Nettie hadn’t seen this look on her face before, and she wasn’t sure if Clia was happy at the thought of killing or at the idea that someone, finally, had stepped up to take care of a problem. Clia inched toward the doorway to the kitchen and stood there at attention. Nettie watched Melvin again, his hand reaching for the front door handle, without hesitation. Something in the way he moved was captivating, a lack of fear as he opened the door and slid out into the shadows. Nettie went to the door. Mrs. Haywood was shouting in the background. She could hear her. “For God’s sake, chile, close that door!” But she needed to see. The sky was the color of a bruise. Purple and blue, sunlight just an afterthought as night drew in, and she watched Melvin’s silhouette move down the front steps as if the hailstorm of bottles and rocks pelting in his direction were nonexistent. She mouthed for him to be careful, but he couldn’t hear her. He stopped halfway down the driveway. She waited for him to say something. Anything. Instead, Melvin raised his weapon at hip level. There was no way to see very well in the dark, but that didn’t matter. She knew there was no need to aim. There was a car standing in front of the gate, engine revving, and she knew what he needed to do. And he did. The detonation was more of an explosion. It tore through the night like thunder, and Nettie’s first instinct was to cover her ears. But she stood still, eyes glazed over. For a moment, she wasn’t here in Mrs. Haywood’s house, but in Haiti. Home. Back outside, where the dust rose and the saline smell of the surrounding marshes clung to the air, and her father’s silhouette stood beside her, also pulling the trigger to demonstrate self-defense. The screaming brought her back to the present. Voices shouted in the dark. Melvin’s silhouette moved forward quickly, stealthily. He pointed the weapon at the sky this time and fired another round, and another, until all Nettie could see was the faint plumes of gunpowder smoking the air and lights shutting off at neighbors’ windows. The voices that had been yelling were now shouting differently. “Shit! Go! Go! They got guns!” Then, there was a rendering of metal and the car took off in an awful sound, tires screeching, its blown off bumper scraping the asphalt. In the surrounding neighborhood, there was screaming, and dogs barked furiously. The neighbor’s dog ran to the fence, just yards away from Melvin, growling. Melvin jumped, and on instinct, he pointed his weapon toward the dog. Not the dog! What did dogs know, other than to bark? The thing hadn’t hurt anyone. She thought Melvin would shoot and she braced herself but she heard nothing. Not a sound but the barking and growling. Melvin was standing just a foot away from her now on the front steps, staring at her. Nettie dropped her hands and felt her face burn. Melvin moved closer into the porch light. She saw a thin layer of sweat on his brow. She caught her breath as he looked in her eyes. They stood there for a brief instant, and she thought he would ask if she was okay, but he didn’t. Instead, he inched even closer to her until she picked up the spicy scent of sweat on him, adrenaline rushing from his pores, and she knew he wanted to get back inside. So, she let him in, and he closed the door behind them. Excerpted from KINGDOM OF NO TOMORROW by Fabienne Josaphat. Used by permission of  Algonquin Books, a division of Hachette Book Group. THE INTERVIEW This interview was conducted between Fabienne Josaphat and Jae Nichelle on December 26, 2025. Thank you for sharing this thrilling excerpt of Kingdom of No Tomorrow . When you began developing the idea for this novel, what was the first thing you knew about your main character, Nettie? I knew Nettie was a survivor of trauma, but she wasn’t defined by it enough to let it stop her. I knew she was going to grow. In my mind, this was a coming-of-age story, even if everything happens quickly in the span of two years, more or less. A lot can happen within that time to change a person, and I knew she was going to be the brave, daring woman I could never be.  What is your definition of literary success? How has it changed over the years as you’ve published more and received some incredible awards? I think success traditionally is measured by the accolades and awards and reviews an author receives, so it’s nice to be acknowledged in that way. But to me, especially with this novel, the definition of success is the conversations it sparks, the passion it ignites, especially in the younger generation, and the number of people who are burning with questions about this period. That’s what changed over the years for me, the need to share and educate with the purpose of awakening the reader to more than just an entertaining story, but to the very core of why I tell the story. It’s like the Black Panther Party slogan said, “Educate to Liberate.” I see my writing leaning into education in some aspects, and this to me is also the measure of my literary success. In your Pen Ten Interview , you said you love how fiction “forces the reader to feel .” What books have made you feel in the past few months? I think of a lovely novel that surprised me, The Death of Comrade President  by Alain Mabanckou. It made me feel delight and amusement and despair all at once, which was new to me. I didn’t know I could experience all this at the same time. Plus, it took me into unknown territory: Congo-Brazzavile in 1970s, so I was able to navigate nostalgia and tap into the pride and the fear of the moment as the characters experience political and social upheaval. Percival Everett’s James also made me feel like I was there, on the plantation, on the river, running for my life, running toward my family, and experiencing all the perils and risks of an enslaved character in the South. I would love to hear more about your screenwriting! What first drew you to this mode of storytelling, and what has your journey been like with your scripts? This started out in college during my undergrad. I took a creative writing class where we had to learn to write screenplays, and I was so taken by the process that I wrote a spec script for a popular TV Show just as a test. And I did well enough that my professor noticed. Then, later on, my first novel started as a screenplay – it was my way of telling the story in a fast-paced, cinematic way, and I realized that could be the bones of a novel. Screenplays and treatments are fun for me; I find them thrilling! I’d love to see myself write more screenplays. What led you to start your Substack newsletter of craft lessons and advice for writers? What’s a craft topic you could talk about for hours? The Substack is a weird mix of everything, really. It’s a bit of craft, a bit of storytelling, a bit of deep thinking. I do like to share craft and advice, though, because I realize it’s why people take the time to read an online newsletter: they want to know what’s on your mind, what you’ve been working on, and they want you to bring them value, teach them, or tell them something surprising. So craft is that value for me. And I could talk about plot forever. It’s the least explored element of fiction; it’s not at all what people usually think it is, and it gives me joy to help others make that distinction between story and plot. As a creative writing instructor and mentor, do you find that working with emerging writers influences your own creative process? That has varied. Some of my mentees and students take writing very seriously, almost like it’s a mechanical task that has to be planned out down to the exact number of days or hours spent on a subject. I have learned from them to give myself more permission to be creative and less rigid. And then there are students and mentees who approach writing almost as a spiritual journey, and from them I’ve learned to open myself up spiritually as well. It’s been a fascinating experience in that way: teaching and mentoring end up being a mutual growth journey. What are you looking forward to? Either personally or professionally, something small or something big! At the moment, I’m looking forward to finishing the draft of my next book - a sequel to Kingdom of No Tomorrow . I’d like to get to the finish line so that I can jump into the next project. How can people support you right now? I appreciate reviews after my readers are done reading. Writers need those. The second thing writers like me need is time and space to write (writer residencies or retreats are ideal). And of course, it helps to grow a writer’s following – I write on Substack, and growing my readership is something I’m working on.  Name another Black woman writer people should know.  One of my literary heroes is the illustrious Maryse Condé from Guadeloupe, who left us last year. Her narrative voice and her body of work, centering Black voices and Black women like her seminal novel I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem , should be required reading. And because I feel she should be or already is well known, I’ll throw in another: Yanick Lahens, the award-winning Haitian author who is also translated into English. We should all read her and let her prose transform us. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Click here to support Torch Literary Arts.

Mofiyinfoluwa O. is a Nigerian writer living between Lagos and London. Her work is concerned with the interior of African|Black womanhood. She is a graduate of the Iowa Nonfiction Writing Program and The Founder of The Abebi AfroNonfiction Foundation. Her work has appeared in Guernica , Black Warrior Review , Variant Lit , Pleiades , Ploughshares, and elsewhere. Her work has been selected as a Best American Essay Notable Entry (2022) and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She is currently at work on her debut memoir interrogating the body, soul, spirit, and their relationship with desire. Victoria Island Blues We have always known that the land bears witness. That it watches. A thing does not need to have eyes to see. We are an expanse of land in the heart of Victoria Island; 2.7 acres of lush sprawling greenery, only a leap from Ozumba Mbadiwe Avenue, only a leap from the mouth of the ocean. We have a thousand tiny corners where many dangerous and beautiful things happen. Muri Okunola Park is what they call us, but we know that we are more than just a park, more than green grass trampled underneath eager feet, more than just a place. Even then. A place can behold the clumsy knees of a teenage girl become the sturdy legs of a woman. A place can remain unchanged – dark green bars forming an iron fence, pillars of marble scattered across the field, a black gate that holds many secrets – as it watches a young girl transform every single time she sets foot on the body of our premises. There is no way to tell the story of M becoming a woman in Lagos without mentioning us. Long before the tendrils of womanhood even find her, we see her. It is a rare and beautiful thing to bear witness to the unfurling of a flower – to watch tentative petals reveal themselves in glorious splendor. And what is a glorious tale if it is not told? What is the use of all that beauty, all that danger, all that rage, if we keep it to ourselves?   6th August 2016.  The first time she sets foot on these grounds, M. is a seventeen-year-old girl desperate to be desired. You couldn’t see it, though. Unless you looked beyond her carefully manufactured confidence, her stellar grades, her mouth always moving, always distracting, always performing. But if you looked past all that, past the white off shoulder top she chose to wear that day for its ability to hide her entire midriff, past the funny-looking eyebrows she took hours to pencil in and conceal, past the constant fidgeting to make sure she looked fine – you would only see a young darkskinned girl attending a music festival. Lucid Lemons – the hottest hub for young creatives – is hosting a live show for alté musicians, and her sister, ear to the ground on the scene, had told her to be there. Just a few weeks ago, the tailor she met on the scene of her filmmaker cousin’s movie made her a pair of ankara shorts. Red flowers, yellow circles with splotches of white. The perfect fit to show some thigh whilst being high-waisted enough to keep her belly (oh the great belly) out of sight. That day, she is in the midst of a very delicate equation she is trying to balance: how to hide herself, whilst still showing enough skin to draw boys’ eyes, to make them see that although she is fat, although the inside of her thighs are almost black with the heat of constant friction, although she is terrible at makeup, she is still beautiful, still deserving of their eyes, their mouths, their hands. Still, she dances. With her feet in dainty white sandals in the late August air, she sways. Only a few weeks ago, she graduated from Olashore International School, and in the next few weeks she is off to Durham University in the cold cold North of England to study law. Oh, how she dreams of being a lawyer. All those blazers hiding her fat, flabby arms. All those long-sleeved shirts to conceal shoulders. All that brilliance she will radiate. She is certain, unshakably resolved to be a lawyer. And she has the brains for it. Her WAEC results are out any day now and she cannot wait for the rush of validation. Yes, there may be no boys who find her attractive enough to come and say hello, but the litany of As littering her report card will warrant the praise of her family, her teachers, and all her friends. Her iPhone 6 buzzes in her little white purse. Her English teacher, Mrs Emezue, is calling. Slightly confused, she picks up her phone, and a frantic, excited voice blares through the speakers ‘ Fiyin! Fiyin! WAEC results are out! Send me your details now! Let me check for you .' Squealing and jumping, the girl reels off the registration number she had memorized waiting for this exact moment. With bated breath, she waits as her teacher fishes out the results. A few minutes pass, and Mrs Emezue begins to scream with joy: ‘ My girl! My girl! My girl! All As and only one B (of course, she had a B in math) ! You did it! All As and one B!’  Her face cracks into a smile so big, it battles the setting sun for radiance. We see her then, realizing her own power, forgetting the boys for a moment, utterly pleased with herself. The sun will set, and Odunsi The Engine will croon ‘you’re my desire, gone around the world just to find her, omoge wa gbe mi saya’  and she will sing out those lyrics with reckless abandon – her voice lifting towards the heavens like smokefire, the voice of a girl trying so very hard to be enough for herself.    24th December 2017. Her skirt is short, so short that her thighs sparkle in their nakedness under the starless Lagos night. The skirt – faux leather embroidered with small red, green, and blue flowers – was bought with her mother in the New Look on Oxford Street nine months ago when she turned eighteen. An adult. And her body is starting to show it. The skin of her thighs is rubbed down with whipped shea butter and coconut oil, gleaming with a vengeance, pollen waiting for the touch of bees. Her top is deep red, baring her shoulders with waterfall sleeves that ripple in the evening breeze. An airy, round, perfect afro crowns her head steadfastly, and a velvet choker, encrusted with many silver hearts sparkling one to another – much like choreographed constellations – wraps the expanse of her neck. Gone is that shy and fidgeting girl of many moons ago. This is the M that has come into the knowledge of her beauty. She has spent the last many months shopping for clothes that fit her frame, shedding all that deadweight of insecurity, standing in front of her camera day after day, photograph after photograph, teaching her brain to look at her body and call it beautiful. If you check her camera roll, you will find many nude pictures, mostly in black and white; she has been cartographing the expanse of her body, rolls of flesh, a sprawling belly, stretch marks across the entire width of her back. She has studied her body like ancient scripture. Her endeavors have been fruitful. So fruitful, in fact, that in the months that have passed since we last saw her, she has obtained a lover that she obsesses over in a near-feral manner. He is sitting beside her now on the raffia mats spread across the park, the smell of chicken barbecue and burning herb dancing through the air as Bez is stringing a guitar and crooning seductively; his voice traveling over them in enchanting waves. In that moment, her gloss-coated lips spill open with laughter, time and time again, as the hands of the clock move nearer and nearer to midnight. No call from her mother. The freedom is delicious. And she is feasting fat on every single bite. D, beside her, reaches out to cover her shoulder with his arm and she lets him, lets herself feel the weight of a man settle on her, and she decides she likes it. On those mats, she is a budding flower unaware of just how bright her bloom will be.  28th of December 2019. Her belly is full of gin when she arrives at our gates. Beefeater to be exact. Straight from the bottle, no mixer, no chaser. No, she’s the one being chased tonight – those wide hips encased in deep red, the smooth brown of her shoulders bared to the night sky, lips a pulsing red sea perfect for drowning. Just a few minutes ago, she was at a wedding where men were tripping over themselves to get her phone number as she weaves and bobs between them with the ease of a woman who now knows how to handle men. The Uber ride from Elegushi to Victoria Island is only fifteen minutes, and in that time, she peels herself out of a sinfully tight black dress into an equally (if not more) sinfully tight red jumpsuit. She surprises herself with how deft she has become at navigating this city, this big and blooming life. Maybe there is  something about heartbreak that sharpens a woman’s senses. She would know. Five months ago, D said he could no longer love her. And she wept. Worried herself sick with errant thoughts of insufficiency. Wept some more. And then one day, tired of wallowing, she reached out to a man and swallowed him whole, and the tears ceased. Discovering this formula, the girl has developed a ravenous appetite for dick and alcohol (both in surplus in Lagos every December), perfected the calibration, and when she sets her feet on Muri Okunola Park that night, she is ready. Red, blue, and pink lights strobe from every corner of the park, and the air is thick with the sweat of bodies, the heady scent of too many joints burning at the same time, and music so loud it reverberates through her entire body as she meanders her way to the front of the stage where Show Dem Camp is booming their music. When Tec calls out to the audience for girls who are ready to come dance on stage, she does not hesitate. The security man hoists her up like she doesn’t weigh 95kg, and in that moment, she feels light as air as her gold-sandaled feet land on the stage. Her eyes are lined with laali, auburn and blond braids piled in the perfect ponytail. The bass is jumping and she begins to whine her waist, hips brushing from side to side, arms lifted in bliss as that jumpsuit cleaves to every inch of her body, its thin straps digging into the flesh of her shoulders as the fabric strains to contain the euphoria pouring from her. She sways from side to side, running her hands along the grooves of her belly, sticking her tongue out, grinning endlessly as she is being carried by the music to a very magical place. The energy is galactic, hundreds of bodies vibrating and chanting lyrics backed by the most electric live band as the stage is beamed in seething rays of red and blue and pink. There she is in this galaxy, entirely untethered, sensual and free - a woman who is dancing like she knows exactly what her body can do. If you look closely, you will see the back of the jumpsuit rides low enough to reveal the rolls of flesh she once desperately kept hidden. Now, she does not give a fuck. In that moment, nothing matters, not even the useless lair she wants so desperately to fuck, the one who has called her phone seven times now, not even him. She is ascendant, moving with the air, moving the body she taught herself to love, moving it with ease and gladness. On that stage, in front of all those people, in front of us, underneath the starless Lagos night, M. celebrates herself, and what we see is a woman ready to feast on herself, knowing she will be satisfied.  24th December 2021. They are both drenched in sweat when we see them, and god are they a sight to behold. He; head full of hair, a pink floral shirt with one too many buttons undone, a silver necklace shimmering in the darkness of night, and black jeans so tight, they could be another layer of skin. She – our girlwomanmagicbeing – is clad in an emerald green bralette, complete with ropes that criss-cross the skin between her breasts, free and unbound with nipples peeking to greet the night air. Her burgundy trousers, tight at the waist and flared towards her feet, have slipped much lower than their initial placement to reveal her waistbeads – all ten of them; red, gold, blue, and bronze, glittering and seductive in the midnight hue. It is another December and another Show Dem Camp concert, but this time she is not on stage. This time she is in the arms of a lover who sees her entirely, a lover her body calls siren-like, and he answers every single time. Their faces are split in these ethereal smiles as they exchange a tiny gold flask between themselves. No one else knows, but just before they arrived here, in a small hotel room off Ozumba, they split a heart-shaped pill into two, each person slipping their half into heated mouths chased with cold Orijin. It hit in the middle of the show. Rays of heat deep from the core of their bodies began to radiate outwards, a kind of cosmic energy beaming from within. Now, the girl is chanting lyrics, engaged in a full-blown rap battle of one: CHOP LIFE CREW, JAIYE TIMES TWO, AFTER ROUND ONE, SHE WANT TATOO. The words tumble from her mouth with a volume she didn't even know she possessed, ebullient and loud as she bounces from one leg to another, everyone around her staring in a mixture of amusement and mild confusion. She does not care. From her small red purse, she retrieves a perfect rolled joint. Oh. This is new. Slinging it between her deep red fingernails, she lifts it to her mouth, flicks her neon lighter against its twisted tip, and takes a deep drag as her eyes flutter closed. She holds it within her, seconds passing before she releases the smoke skyward. Her movements, seamless with the ease of frequency. She does it again, the skin of her bare face supple with sweat, shining. There is a serene beauty to her in the way her entire body rejects the performance of perfection. She is not sucking in her belly, not fretting about the downward slope of her breasts, not concealing the bags underneath her eyes. She is just a girl in a park in the city she loves, getting high with the man she loves. It is all so simple. She lifts the joint to W’s mouth, placing it between his lips, feeding him as her fingers brush his bottom lip, warm and supple. He smiles at her from underneath his eyes. A look passes between them, and we know they will soon carry their bodies away from here to do what they hunger for. To speak a language only their bodies understand. Looking at them, you would only see a young couple having fun in Lagos on Christmas Eve. But if you looked closer, you would see a small fresh scar underneath her belly button, obscured by the beads. Her eyes are slits now, blurred by herb and drink, but just a few hours ago, they poured torrents because her body refused to allow itself to be taken by the man she wanted to give it to. At first, we conclude that wholeness can be an act, easy to put on in a jam-packed field in the middle of Victoria Island. But then we watch her even closer – the move of her hips, the way her eyes light up when her lover traces the skin at the base of her neck, the way she closes her eyes to soak up all that music, all that joy, all that magic – and we know that even broken things possess their own wholeness, a cacophony of healing to rage against the silence of suffering and our girl from all those years ago is still here, still bending, still shifting, still becoming. She walks out of the park that night, and we wrap our arms around her, rejoicing over resilience and beauty, rejoicing over all the ways a girl becomes a woman who fights to be alive and whole, enough for herself in every season. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Click here to support Torch Literary Arts.

Nitashia Johnson is a multimedia visual artist and educator from Dallas, Texas whose work has been exhibited across Texas and internationally. To care about stories is to care about the world, and understanding our own gives us purpose. For as long as she can remember, storytelling through art has been Nitashia Johnson’s way of understanding the world around her and her place within it. As a multidisciplinary artist and educator from Dallas, Texas, her journey since life started has led her through a rich creative education at Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Texas Woman’s University, and the Rhode Island School of Design. Now, she works as a Digital Media Specialist while also pursuing work in photojournalism, videography, and education. The belief that art holds the power to transform lives has been at the heart of all the work she does, from founding The Smart Project, a non-profit after-school program for teens in North Texas, to leading creative workshops that help young people discover their unique voices. Over the years, her work has continued to grow and expand into new spaces. The Self Publication Series is a photographic exploration she formed to challenge the stereotypes surrounding the Black community, offering a more nuanced, empowering narrative. Her project, The Beauty of South Dallas, documents the rapid transformation of a historical neighborhood affected by socio-economic shifts, while The Faces That Face works to shine a light on environmental injustices in West Dallas. In Body & Earth , she explores the deep, often overlooked connection between Blackness and the natural world. By using Black muses to embody the elements of Earth, Fire, Water, Air, and Space, she confronts the systemic neglect of both Black communities and the environment. She aims to save lives through art, just as it saved hers. Beyond The Fire The Faces that Face Selections from Black Earth The Beauty of South Dallas "Conflict" Directed by Nitashia Johnson THE INTERVIEW This interview was conducted between Nitashia Johnson and Jae Nichelle on October 13th, 2025. Thank you so much for sharing your incredible work with us! I'm so obsessed with the image “ Beyond the Fire.” Can you talk about how it came to be? Beyond the Fire  is part of my ongoing series Body and Earth , a project that connects Blackness and nature as a way to advocate for both. I use them symbolically to show how Earth can serve as a source of healing, escape, and meditation, but also to reflect on how industries often exploit natural elements in ways that harm marginalized communities, especially Black communities. I know this firsthand because I grew up in those very environments, witnessing both the beauty and the neglect. This work is my way of reimagining that relationship, aligning Blackness with the natural world rather than opposing it. It challenges the idea of Earth as a destructive force toward Black life and instead positions both as powerful, resilient, and deeply interconnected. You've had teachers and mentors in Dallas who recognized your abilities and pushed you forward. How do those early influences show up now, both in your art and in how you mentor for The Smart Project? What qualities do you try to carry forward from those mentors? The teachers, mentors, and even family members who influenced me really changed my life. It was the thought they put into their care for me, the support, the guidance, the intention to make sure I felt seen. That kind of love and attention stuck with me, and it’s a big reason why I do what I do today. Those early influences shaped how I see the world and why I feel it’s so important to serve young people, which is why I created The Smart Project. I remember how amazing it felt to have people believe in me when I was a kid. That support opened the door to creativity and made me realize what was possible. My mentors and teachers helped water the seed my mom planted. Even though she wasn’t always around, she left a beautiful gift. So now, I try to carry that same energy forward in my art and through the youth I work with. My creative practice is all about inspiring others and leaving messages behind that get people thinking. And even though running a small nonprofit can be challenging, it’s worth it. Passing creativity and support down to the next generation is extraordinary and deeply important to me. Speaking of Dallas, your project, The Beauty of South Dallas,  attempted to capture your community amid the active threat of gentrification. What is your relationship with your hometown now? The thing is, South Dallas is the very place that changed my life. It’s where I met my first art teacher, the one who inspired me to go to art school, to become a graphic designer, and to see art as a real career path. That all happened at Pearl C. Anderson Junior High School. The school isn’t open anymore, it's been bought by a church, but the impact it had on me will always stay. When I lived in that community, I was going through a lot personally, but I also believe it was all part of my process. It’s amazing how life works and how the same place that first inspired me creatively became the one I returned to years later to document through my photography. The Beauty of South Dallas  began as a three-month project through the Juanita J. Craft House Artist Residency. At first, my goal was simply to document the community. But as I started working, I realized I needed to capture more than just the place; I wanted to show the essence of the people, the soul that makes the land what it is. That’s how the project got its name. With the ongoing changes and gentrification affecting so many communities, I see photography as a way to freeze time to honor the people, their history, and the beauty that’s always been there. My relationship with my hometown now is one of deep respect and purpose. Just like in West Dallas, my mission is to document, to show the beauty, and to reveal the truth that the people are indeed what make these communities so special. As a child, what were some of your earliest creative inspirations? For me, there were so many things that inspired me. The sky would inspire me, just seeing the clouds. It could be the way light poured through the window. That would be inspiration. My step-granddad, whom I call my grandpa because he was such a wise man, once told me to never lose my smile. That was an inspiration. Although my mom was in my life, she served as a huge inspiration too because she introduced me to the power of drawing, using a pencil to make marks and create something visual. It was the love from a sibling, from my auntie. It was also inspired by fear, the fear of trying things but still doing it anyway. I would even find inspiration in the people I met. That still resides in me today. I get inspired by everything. I can hear a song and be inspired. I can see someone’s cool shoes or outfit and be inspired. Their aesthetic might spark an idea for a photo shoot. I can see a location and be inspired. I can see and feel something and be inspired. I can look at the ocean and be inspired. Everything inspires me. When I think about the work I’m doing now with Body and Earth, how I’m aligning and intertwining nature more into my practice, I realize that energy flows through everything we see and consume. I try to take in the right energy to inspire me. And I love those who inspire me, because that’s the kind of life I want to live, one that’s inspirational, inspiring others while allowing others to inspire me. That, to me, is the beauty of connectivity, of unity, and just being free. Were there any narratives that came up while you interviewed people for The Self Publication  that surprised you? The self-publication is a combination of community stories where I, you know, capture people from within the American Black community, and I capture their narratives, and I edit them, and I use my design and photography skills to produce a book publication that is self-published. I would say there were things that tugged at my heart, but that didn't come as a surprise, right? Because we're all different in many ways. Blackness isn't just one thing, but we're all so diverse in our being, but we come together as this collective that shares the same experiences, culture, styles, foods, mannerisms, beauty, and spirit, right? So, because I'm so intertwined, and I've read history through and through, and I continue to learn, many of the things that I was able to read that highlighted their experiences didn't come as a surprise, but it did remind me of how magical, and just beautiful, and powerful they were to have overcome so many of these things. The words that they wrote were just so magnificent, and inspiration, and an inspiration for me to keep going and working on this. I can't wait to see what's next for this project, because I plan to work on Volume Four. It will be done in a different way, but it's been truly remarkable. I think the only thing that surprised me was the beauty in their souls, but that wasn't even a surprise at all, because of course they have that. Your work in photojournalism, design, videography, multimedia, as well as education. How does your artistic approach shift between the different modalities? How does my approach shift? It's kind of like one area leads into the next, and they all kind of intertwine, which is quite extraordinary. Photojournalism deals with storytelling and utilizing my photography skills, which also helps me build my people skills, right, as far as connecting and being very empathetic when dealing with their stories, while also using the technical skills of photography. When it relates to design, design is a different way to reveal the story and provide information. You’re laying out information and using a sense of hierarchy, not to say that any piece of information is less important than another, but to use different elements together as a way to deliver the message or tell the story so that it reaches people, and it’s also pleasing to the eye. Design has worked to support The Self Publication , The Beauty of South Dallas , and pretty much all of my projects, including the nonprofit, The Smart Project, because I’m able to design things in a way that will capture the attention of those I’m trying to reach. When it comes to videography, photography has inspired my eye for composition and storytelling, so I’m able to dive into filmmaking to create things that are poetic, emotional, and cinematically beautiful. As a multimedia or multidisciplinary artist, I just love to explore, so everything ties into my entire being. It makes up the core of who I am. By doing all of these things, it also pours over into education, because what I learn in the real world is what I teach my students. The same way my grandpa gave me his wisdom and told me to never lose my smile, I relay that same information. What you learn and what you experience in life is what you teach, so I decided to teach wisdom through my creative practice. I shift between all of them because it brings me joy, and overall, they support the base of my projects in their entirety. If you had a personal theme song, what would it be? Oh my gosh, this is so hard. Like, what kind of question is this, haha? No, I mean that in a great way. This is so funny because I don’t know. I think I would say, if I had a theme song overall as an artist… oh, this is hard. I’m so eclectic when it comes to music. Like I mentioned before, I’m inspired by so many things depending on how I’m feeling. One of the very first songs that inspired me when I was very young was Bittersweet Symphony . The way that buildup happened, I just imagine myself driving down the road with the top down on a sunny day, just feeling free. I thought that was beautiful. That would be my song of choice for just free thoughts. Another one is Candy Rain  by Soul For Real. I really love how that made me feel. Of course, there are so many different genres and music artists that I love. I’m inspired by a little bit of Leon Thomas right now. But overall, right now, I would say my theme song is this beat I heard called Heartburn  by Tenseoh. That song is so cool. It’s such a badass song, a badass beat, and it just makes me feel super dope. Who knows, my theme song might change next week, but nevertheless, it helps me align with the themes I’m putting out into the world. What a hard question, but a beautiful one, though. How can people support you right now? I would love support in inspiring youth through The Smart Project . Any donations would help, and if anyone wants to be a teaching artist or a source of inspiration for the youth, that would be amazing as well. Also, helping to spread the word about my series The Self Publication, The Power of Black Stories , would be incredible. Whether that’s aligning with a publisher or helping reach a wider audience to share these stories with the world, any support there would be beautiful. Following my creative journey is another way to support me. I’m really expanding on Body and Earth , and I’m working on a subcategory of that project called Black Earth: The Story of Jai , which is extraordinary and beautiful. I can’t wait to share it with the world. It’s a slow buildup, but I believe that anything truly meaningful and deep takes time. I’m also working on a short film with an amazing team of women, and you can see more of that on my social media. You can sign up for my email list by sending me a note at info@nitashiajohnsn.com . That way, you can stay in the loop about what I’m creating, what I’m working on, and how you can support. And it’s also about reciprocity. I love finding ways to collaborate and support others because I believe a community stays full by pouring back and forth into each other’s cups. Name another Black woman artist people should know.   One would be Myca Williamson (Creative Director), and Vanessa Meshack (printmaking/painter/educator). They're really great artists. I would also like to recommend Lisa Ford (Creative Director / Filmmaker / Designer). Lisa is phenomenal. Myca is golden. Vanessa is an angel. Just brilliant. They are all beautiful, strong women. I would also love to support my Lil Big Sister (NJ), who I love so much and is a great poet. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.

Nandi Comer is an award-winning poet and essayist. She was appointed as Michigan's poet laureate in 2023, becoming the state's first poet laureate since the 1950s. Nandi Comer  served as the 2nd Poet Laureate of the state of Michigan from 2023 to 2025. She is the author of the chapbook,   American Family: A Syndrome   (Finishing Line Press). Her debut poetry collection, Tapping Out  (Triquarterly)  won the Society of Midland Authors Award and Julie Suk Award. She has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Callaloo, Modern Ancient Brown, Mass Moca, the Academy of American Poets, among others. She currently serves as the 2025-2026 Jay C. and Ruth Halls Poetry Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing and as a co-Director of Detroit Lit. Photo credit: Khary Mason It Was Still the 90s   The decade I fell for so many boys in Jodeci boots. I started my period, finished grade school, middle school, then high school  and it was still the 90s. When a girl and her sisters followed me home wanting a fight, I talked them down with reason and my mother’s  5lb weight in my lap. At sixteen I let a boy have my virginity. At seventeen, I told another  he was my first. A man wanted to come to my house for an innocent visit until I told him I’d lost it. On TV I watched everything from home: MARTIN, O.J., Rodney, Aaliyah  OJ again. All so shiny and sweaty–then   frightening. All anyone wanted was to be fresh and clean. We thought the world would end. Y2K was coming, and the computers,  and the banks and me, lifting my hands through all the falling confetti. On Malice On November 5, 1992, Malice Green died from blunt force trauma to the head after being assaulted by seven Detroit police officers. Of the seven, Walter Budzyn, Larry Nevers, and Robert Lessnau were the only ones to stand trial. Who can understand a crack vile  and lighter, the soft rub of a car’s worn carpet, the weight  of a flashlight, how its steel  can form a blunt blow?  I once was a steelworker  then I became a memorial mural, multicolored balloons, a stuffed animal, an altar. That night, TLC’s Baby, Baby, Baby hummed  from my car. Me, in a head haze,  tilting two steps from the house. They pulled me half out of my car and half into  my afterlife. What could I have done  with no willing witness, no accomplice,  no camera to record my removal, my drag.  By the time the medics cradled my head,  lifted my limbs, drove me away handcuffed, I was already a martyr. Whoever says my night  was small, a momentary slip  has never had their brain explode into seizures, has never had to count the fists to seven, to fourteen, to me. Malice Green’s Mother Mourns Her Son  after Anne Sexton I am taking off my funeral shoes  again. A jade stone grows heavy  in my belly. I have said it one too many times. A boy, run down. A woman lost  on the operating table. But now  my son, a gone ghost, an orifice  no sorry can fill. I don’t have the breath  to kick off cemetery dust, slide the art  of mourning to the floor. My dress  can’t tell the cypress how  to do its dying song.  I am exhausted with all of my dying. Death is a rat scurrying over my chest  and no one knows how to kill it. Beautiful whim, come with your thin veins. Lay your head in my lap.  I am ready to mourn you. Skin. Light. Shade. Almond. Peach. honey- colored. We called them  so many sweet names. Did it matter?  We knew when pretty walked in and  side-eyed herself in a mirror. Jasmine Guy  Tisha Campbell,  Halle Berry. Light girls,  we called pretty. Light boys, we called  pretty, while we chocolate, coffee,  dusty black girls remade ourselves  pink, lavender,  fuchsia-lipped hip-cocked, spread-thighed, dead- pan cute. We propped our bodies’  awkward teeter on our knees’  unsteady lean on bathroom sinks, necks tilted into our vanities.  I pressed, greased, curled, tucked,  and pinned my kinks. It was me  or a version of me alone  with the toffee-skinned child, poor in clothes but pretty in skin. Gray, my mother called her. Every day  she arrived on our doorstep, mud-smeared,  day-old funk stale. Nothing a curling iron,  or hair spray, or gel couldn’t smooth  into pretty. Her hue, her eyes made me  shadow under such glow. Today I am no better  standing in the grocery line, huffing to work,  leaning over the green billiards table. I know my dark coy will get me so far,  while another’s curls and hair hair hair  tumbling over shoulders at the bar or mall or  café, sipping and sun-kissed,  the pink of their cheeks shrinks me.       I                  fade  disappear and  we all succumb  drown         falling  into that monstrous  glimmering skin. THE INTERVIEW This interview was conducted between Nandi Comer and Jae Nichelle on October 8, 2025. Thank you for sharing these incredible poems. “It was still the 90s” begins as such a personal and specific portrait and zooms out, by the end of the poem, to situate your speaker in the larger societal context of the time. How did you develop the lens through which you approached writing this poem?  Lately, I have been nostalgic about my adolescent years during the 1990s. I was inspired by today’s fascination with the '90s. It has been fantastic seeing some of our styles reemerge in the public eye, but today’s interest seems to be forgetting some of the core details that I experienced. Like, why don’t people talk about the anxiety we felt during Y2K! I turned ten in 1990 and turned twenty right before Y2K. I wanted this poem to express the immensity of events and changes that occur in a decade: how the body changes, and what the individual experiences reveals about a collective culture. I wanted to tap into the specificity in that shaky transition from girlhood to adolescence and eventual young adult—and the dangers. That poem allowed me to explore my personal memories and contemplate how the “I” could be a universal nostalgic “we.” “On Malice” and “Malice Green’s Mother Mourns her Son” are written through the perspective of Malice and then his mother. Do you have a process for how you so carefully adopt different voices in your work, especially those of real people? The persona poem or the dramatic monologue is something I often tap into for storytelling. I am inspired by writers like Patricia Smith, Ai, and Wisława Szymborska. Persona allows me to better explore a topic or experience. At times, it feels like “spirit work” where I open myself and invite the voice to say what needs to be said. For a long time, I have used personas to deeply explore acts that confuse me, particularly acts of violence. I often wonder what it takes to inflict or endure violent acts.  Malice Green's murder was a case that rippled through Detroit and extended across the nation. There were daily vigils and protests immediately following his murder, and a long trial followed. Because the incident occurred nine months after the LA riots, everyone was afraid that Detroit would erupt into uprisings as well. Despite being a significant historical moment for Detroit, the Detroit Public Library has only one book about his death—a memoir by one of the police officers. In these two poems, I wanted to document two Detroit voices so that they are not forgotten.  At a time when many communities' stories are in danger of being erased, the persona poem is an approach that allows me to retell as closely as possible and offer an archive for narratives that are already being forgotten. As Michigan’s 2nd Poet Laureate (2023–2025), you launched “Michigan Words,” a statewide campaign of billboards that feature quotes from Michigan poets. What moments from that project stay with you most vividly? The moment that stays with me most is the pride the writers expressed when they talked about their families seeing the billboards for the first time. M. Bartley Siegel told me his mom was more excited about the billboard than a lot of his other poetry accomplishments. Jonah Mixon-Webster called it life-changing. While I was traveling the state, I passed some of those billboards, and at times I’d get out of my car to take pictures. It was amazing seeing big, larger-than-life pictures of my peers. We all got to relish the stunning verse of poets like Brittany Rogers—whose author photo, by the way, is every bit as captivating as her lyric. You also helped create the PBS/WKAR video series Michigan in Verse . What drew you to the video format for this project? How was the experience? Before my appointment, Michigan had not had a Poet Laureate in 60 years. I was fortunate to be approached with many ideas for projects by so many community members. When WKAR and the Library of Michigan asked if I wanted to produce a poetry series, how could I say no? I immediately wanted to feature as many poets as possible. Michigan is so rich with a diverse poetry community. I wanted to bring the whole poetry family on set.  Collaboration was at the heart of everything I did as Michigan’s Poet Laureate. All of the events, readings, and conferences I did were the result of collective work. The Michigan in Verse  was the result of a strong collaborative team where each individual member contributed their expertise to the project. The producers at WKAR possessed all the technical knowledge regarding cameras and sets. They turned to me for the knowledge about Michigan poets that would represent the state and bring a unique texture to the series. It was a very harmonious leadership strategy where we each deferred to the person who best knew when it was their time to conduct the production. It was great fun celebrating poets from around the state. The series is still up on the station's website for the world to view. I love it! When thinking of the many fellowships you’ve held (from Cave Canem and Callaloo to your current fellowship with the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing), what aspects of these fellowships have most transformed your writing practice? Of all the writing opportunities I have received, Cave Canem, by far, carries the most impact. It was my first writing retreat and the first time participating in an international community of writers. I met so many kinds of black writers—writers from New York to Montana to Washington. I met writers I had read, who I never thought I would have the opportunity to sit in a room with. It was hard work, but also a lot of fellowship. I forged forever friendships. The space broadened my understanding of what my life could be as a writer in the world. I don’t think I would have attempted anything that came after if I had not had that opportunity. I think every writer deserves a space that gives them a sense of belonging, one that completely transforms their understanding of themselves. What questions are you exploring in your work right now? I am thinking a lot about the role archives play in our community. The act of deeming someone important to society and asking them to place their personal and professional records in an archive is a wild thing we humans do. I am meditating on questions like who gets an official archive in a library. What spaces outside of libraries can be sustainable sites for archives? What kind of technology will allow for the longevity of an archive? What is appropriate for an archive? Letters to a Mayor? YouTube videos of 90s dance shows? Can my aunt's recipe box be an archive? It all boils down to what we as communities want to remember.  You were raised in Detroit and represent the city heavily in your writing. What do you love about Detroit’s literary scene?  Detroit’s literary scene is lovely. We have all kinds of poets. We have a history of literary giants, such as Dudley Randall and Robert Hayden, but we also have a rich performance and slam poetry scene with a dynamic legacy. Without the influence of a large institution driving a particular aesthetic, Detroiters tend to be self-taught or mentored by other poets. This develops a drive and hunger that is unique to each poet. In many cities, one can tell their local influences. I don’t see that in the writers from my city. Aricka Froeman, Brittany Rogers, Tommye Blount, jessica Care moore, and Jamaal May all write incredibly differently from one another, yet we all come from the same city. I love that! Where would you take a food critic who was visiting Detroit? You’re trying to get me in trouble. I'm not sure about a food critic, but any friend of mine who visits me in Detroit is going to get Middle Eastern food. Since the Detroit area is home to the largest Arab community in the United States, Middle Eastern cuisine is important to our culture. We take our falafel and shawarma very seriously. People try to take me to try restaurants in other regions, and they just don’t have the same flavor. We have drive-thru restaurants that are top-tier. How can people support you right now? I am expanding my teaching offerings. I would love to come to your community to teach. I've been working on new workshops and generative classes. Invite me out.  Name another Black woman writer people should follow.  Just one?!?!?! I am here for all black woman writers, but right now, I would love to uplift Jassmine Parks and Maryhilda Obasiota Ibe two very different poets, but fabulous writers. ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Click here to support Torch Literary Arts.

a. adenike phillips (she/her) is a poet, cultural worker and collagist based in New Jersey. She believes in the transformative ability of art to heal, disrupt and reshape sight. She writes toward the interior lives of Black people—stories that slip between generations and place, often going unnoticed. Phillips has received support from AWP, Hurston/Wright, POWERHOUSE Residency, Arts by The People, and others. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in the North American Review, The Fire Inside Anthology Volume III, The Amistad, Gulf Stream Magazine, and elsewhere. Her visual work was exhibited through the Community Scholars program at Rutgers, Newark. Phillips is completing her first full manuscript of poetry. saint handyman   damn us all for never praisin’ the working saints, minor as they may seem. like mr. jesse of south tenth street, common relic of fixin’ & buildin’—hands might could heal   anything he touched. his long salt & pepper beard, nest for lost washers & morsels of last night’s cornbread.  in desperation my family petitioned the patron saint of plumbers,   jesse needed of a pair of good fittin’ pants, sturdy suspenders or a king-sized belt to spare us from basking in the black moon each time he bent over.  but mostly jesse needed   his wife to hold him up, to unfurl the worlds that coursed through his hands.  hands that knew the angles of wood  & the angles of her body, hands  that could smooth her out from her shoulders  to the soles of her feet. jesse a man so handy, each finger a saintly instrument.  praise be— the cuts, praise be the cracks, praise be  the grease, praise be the splinters, praise be every nail that pricked his palms. bless his   broken down         holdin’ on          holdin’ up,  holdin’   out       each night beholding   to what was unsayable.  in his arms, a bottle of 80-proof pillow-talkin’ him at the altar of dreamin’ where his wife was still keepin’ house, tendin’ to kids, her voice tenderin’ all their card game disputes & sawhorse rodeos. she got to hummin’ a hymn,  to skillet cornbread.  she got to her way of fixin’  of healin’  everything in her wake.  praise be— ### Torch Literary Arts  is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats. Donate to help Torch amplify Black women writers.