Celebration: Poets East and West Read on Freedom 

A celebration of emancipation from the east coast and west coast. Two Bay Area poets and two Baltimore, Maryland poets read in honor of African American freedom in commemoration of the Juneteenth holiday.  

A partnership between the African American Center of the San Francisco Public Library and the African American Department of the Enoch Pratt Free Library.  

The Poets:

Alie Jones is a self-care advocate, writer, artist, and Creole mermaid. She is a founder of Bodacious Bombshells, a wellness collective in Oakland. Alie is passionate about centering our breath work as sacred and hopes to build a legacy of awareness and expression. She is the Director and Co-founder of Black Freighter Press, a revolutionary press committed to the exploration of liberation. Alie graduated with a BA in Cinematic Arts & Technology from CSU Monterey Bay & a minor in Creative Writing & Social Action. She received her MPA from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies as well as a MFA from Mills College in Creative Writing. Alie is the host of the podcast called Chit Chat with Aliecat, exploring self-care practices & journeys of self-love. 

Kevin Dublin is an educator, economic justice advocate, filmmaker, and writer of grants, poetry, prose, scripts & code.  As founder of Living Room SF, he produces readings, publishes others, and facilitates partnerships in the Bay. He is the recipient of fellowships and awards from the San Francisco Arts Commission, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Center for Cultural Innovation, Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing and more. Kevin has taught writing at Duke University’s Youth Programs, San Diego State, East Carolina University and in the community with students from ages 5 - 105 at various K-12 schools & non-profits across the US. He is the author of Eulogy (2023) and How to Fall in Love in San Diego (2017). You can find recent work in Brooklyn Rail, Ploughshares, Konch and Apocrypha Magazine. Kevin lives in San Francisco, but is proudly from Smithfield, NC, and believes in you and the power of collective transformation. 

Abdul Ali—poet, writer, educator, and cultural worker—was most recently program director of the Maryland State Council’s County Arts and Arts and Entertainment Districts programs. Mr. Ali has held distinguished teaching appointments at Johns Hopkins University, Howard University, and Morgan State University, to name a few. For his literary work, Ali has been recognized by the Robert Deutsch Foundation, Cave Canem Foundation, Sewanee, DC Commission on the Arts and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts (VCCA). He is the author of Trouble Sleeping which won the 2014 New Issues Poetry Book Prize selected by Fannie Howe. His poems have been published in numerous literary journals including Copper Nickel, Little Patuxent Review, and Poet Lore. Currently, Mr. Ali is the Associate Director of Development at Baltimore Arts Realty Corporation (BARCO) and is the founder and principal of The Ali Consultancy. 

Kateema Lee is a Washington D.C. native. Her recent work has been published in print and online journals such as Pirene’s Fountain, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, African American Review, Gargoyle and others. She is the author of Almost Invisible (2016), Musings of a Netflix Binge Viewer (2018), Transcript of the Unnamed (2020), Mundane Things (2024). She is a Cave Canem Graduate Fellow, a Callaloo fellow and a participant of The Home School. 

Connect:

Alie Jones - Website

Kevin Dublin - Website

Abdul Ali - Website