Come Hear! 2026
Come Hear! 2026 MARATHON POETRY READING
Come Hear! is a queer reading series founded in 2001 by Nathaniel Siegel and Regie Cabico for The Rainbow Book Fair at The LGBT Center which has supported the series since 2008 and is one of two major queer literary book festivals in the United States. Over 30 authors will share original poetry and prose with six to eight writers reading their work every hour. All participants are slated to be published in Tribes Magazine Online 2026.. Come Hear! was founded to bring intergenerational queer authors together while A Gathering of the Tribes has been producing this all-day reading since 2024. This year Nathaniel and Regie are joined by co-curators Drew Pisarra and Irene Villaseñor.
As part of the 14th annual Rainbow Book Fair!
Visit us our table in ROOM 101!
Come Hear! 2026 SCHEDULE
*Please note this schedule is subject to change
12:00 - 1.00
Shea Vassar
Mariah Barber
Sarah M. Sala
Anna Limontas-Salisbury
CQ Quintana
Jai Mohan
Lonely Christopher
Pamela Booker
1:00 - 2.00
Drew Pisarra
Sylvia Jones
Malcolm Tariq
Joey De Jesus
Steve Turtell
2.00 - 3.00
tray tsui
k j tiao
Dan Schapiro
Justice LaBrave
Jamilah Ali
chloe feffer
Kat Sotelo
3.00 - 4.00
Andy Barrow
Tova Greene
Ethan Richmond
Bryan Borland
Dylan Richmond
S.A. Borland
Guillermo Filice Castro
4.00-5.00
Scott Hightower
Don Yorty
Joseph M. Pierce
Irene Villaseñor
Nathaniel A. Siegel
Regie Cabico
Come Hear! 2026 BIOS
Andy Barrow is a New York–based writer whose debut novel, Peter in Progress, draws inspiration from his own later-in-life gay awakening. When he’s not writing, Andy is likely perfecting his backhand, chasing his next cold brew, or making up for lost time on the dance floor.
Anna Limontas-Salisbury is a writer, poet and one time freelance journalist. Her work appears on Santa Fe Writers Project, La Libreta and Sweet Action Poets; anthologies include Panoply: An Inaugural MultiCreative Wisdom Anthology edited by Maria Luisa Arroyo Cruzado and I Wanna Be Loved By You: Poems on Marilyn Monroe by Susana H. Case and Margo Taft Stever.
Benjamin S. Grossberg’s collections of poetry include My Husband Would (University of Tampa Press, 2020), winner of the Connecticut Book Award, and Sweet Core Orchard (University of Tampa Press, 2009), winner of a Lambda Literary Award. His novel, The Spring before Obergefell (University of Nebraska Press, 2024), was selected by Percival Everett for the AWP’s James Alan McPherson Prize and also received a Lambda Literary Award. Ben is Director of Creative Writing at the University of Hartford.
Bryan Borland is founding publisher of Sibling Rivalry Press, founding Editor of Assaracus: A Journal of Gay and Queer Poetry, and author of multiple books of poems, including, most recently, Brotherful, a finalist for the Thom Gunn Award for Gay Poetry.
chloe feffer (they/he/she) is a writer and educator. Their first published piece of short fiction was recognized with a nomination for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers from The B’K Magazine, and their work has been supported by Tin House’s summer workshop and Fine Arts Work Center. chloe’s day-job is directing Lambda Literary’s Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices.
CQ QUINTANA [pronouns: any/all] is a queer nonbinary writer with Cuban blood and New Orleans roots based on Canarsee and Munsee Lenape land in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn. Most recently, CQ received a Literary Arts Fellowship from the Lucas Artists Program at Montalvo Arts Center. Check out Prosebuds, a monthly Substack featuring CQ's work and showcasing the multi-genre writing community.
Dan Schapiro is a disabled writer and printmaker whose work draws from the teachings of Disability Justice, pop music, and birds. He is the author of HOLEPLAY (Nueoi, 2020), a book of poems and images about illness. He is currently working on a book of critical essays about virality and risk.
Don Yorty is the author of two poetry collections, Spring Sonnets and Fucking and Other Poems, and a novel, What Night Forgets. He blogs at donyorty.com, an archive of current art, his own writing, and the work of other poets.
Drew Pisarra is the author of two sonnet collections, Periodic Boyfriends and Infinity Standing Up; two short story collections, You're Pretty Gay and Publick Spanking; and two radio plays, The Strange Case of Nick M. and Price in Purgatory. He also wrote a versified homage to his favorite filmmaker: Fassbinder: His Movies, My Poems.
Dylan Richmond is a choreographer, dancer, and poet from the Connecticut shoreline and the company manager for New York Live Arts and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company. He has presented work and/or performed at TOTAH, WestFest, NYU, The Tank, Bowdoin College, the Bates Dance Festival, Yale, UCLA, and Connecticut College. As a poet, Dylan is a 2024 Pushcart Prize nominee and is notably published in From Root to Seed, Lily Poetry Review, No, Dear, On Paper, and The Foundationalist.
Ethan Richmond is a poet and dancer currently working as the Development Assistant for AILEY. They were the recipient of the Celebrate! Maya Angelou Poetry Fellowship from the Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow and are published in singer-songwriter Kevin Atwater’s Achilles Literary Collection. Ethan has danced and/or read poetry at NYU Tisch, TOTAH, Triskelion Arts, Martha Graham Studio Theater, The Tank, Bennington College, the Grand Ole Opry, and Williams College, where they graduated cum laude as the Class Poet.
Guillermo Filice Castro is the author of the chapbooks I Am Not Alone (Thirty West Publishing House, Fall 2026), Mixtape for a War (Seven Kitchens Press, 2018) and Agua, Fuego (Finishing Line Press, 2015). His work has appeared in Best American Poetry 2023 (edited by Elaine Equi) and many journals, and has been nominated for Pushcart and Best of Net prizes. Castro lives in New Jersey with his husband.
Irene Villaseñor is a poet and multidisciplinary artist whose work explores Indigeneity, injustice, care, and queer belonging. Her writing appears in Queer Nature: An Ecoqueer Poetry Anthology, Nepantla: An Anthology Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color, Nat. Brut, Yellow Medicine Review, North Dakota Quarterly, and Cream City Review, among others. Her manuscript, Get Lost Colonizer: Erasures from the Future, was a runner-up for the Center for Book Arts’ Annual Chapbook Contest.
Jai Mohan (he/him and neopronouns) is a multi-hyphenate artist working at the intersection of spirituality, art, and advocacy.
Jamilah Ali is a queer Progressive Muslim poet who lives in Silver Spring, Maryland with her partner and 2 cats. She believes poetry is our best non-violent tool to counter this pitiful fiasco. She is standing against the war in Iran, and the extinction of trans.
Joey De Jesus is a poet, Lecturer at Columbia University, and former candidate for New York State Assembly residing in Ridgewood, New York.
Joseph M. Pierce is a Cherokee Nation citizen; Professor and Founding Director of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Initiative at Stony Brook University. Author of Speculative Relations: Indigenous Worlding and Repair (Duke UP, 2025).
Justice LaBrave is a Queer New York native with Afro-Boricua Roots. Singer, songwriter, poet and producer, Justice has self-produced 3 studio EPS and performs around the Tristate as a speaker and performer. Most recently Justice is the winner of "Unhinged Idol," QTS (Queer Talent Search) of NYC, and "VOICE OF NYC."
k j tiao is an artist, educator, and shapeshifter currently based in brooklyn. their work has appeared in Washington Square Review, Puerto del Sol, Soap Ear, TPCreview, and elsewhere. Their debut collection, transpacific, won the 2025 Noemi Book Prize, and is forthcoming.
Kat Sotelo is a first-generation Filipinx American performance artist, choreographer, and set designer based in Brooklyn. Her work blends movement, satire, and constructed environments, drawing from her experience in exotic dance to examine the body as a site of commerce and fantasy. With training in sculpture and cinema, she merges maximalist aesthetics in fabrication, film, and live performance.
Linnea Scott is an actor, drag performer, and writer based in Brooklyn. They are in the practice of making art that heals. They are also in the practice of making art that is stupidly funny and builds our stamina for joy.
Lonely Christopher is author of several books of fiction and poetry and is the managing director of Segue Foundation. He is currently writing a queer study of Herman Melville.
Malcolm Tariq is a poet, playwright, and social impact strategist from Savannah, Georgia. He is the author of Heed the Hollow (Graywolf, 2019). He lives in Brooklyn, New York and serves as director of the Prison and Justice Writing Program at PEN America.
Mariah Barber is a queer black nonbinary revolutionary writer weaving tapestries with her words.
Nathaniel A. Siegel created the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual + poetry reading Come Hear! with poet Regie Cabico in order to present L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ poets to L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ persons in L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ friendly places. His chapbook, Tony, was published by Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs.
Pamela Booker is a recipient of a 2024 NJ State Council on the Arts Fellow Award in Prose. An interdisciplinary writer, educator, eco-activist and some-time podcaster, her work spans literary fiction, poetry, essays, and performance-theater arts. She teaches writing, culture, and media-focused courses at Montclair State University.
Regie Cabico is the author of A Rabbit In Search of A Rolex (Day Eight, 2023) and the Interim Executive Director of A Gathering of The Tribes.
S. A. Borland is editor and designer of Sibling Rivalry Press and author of Tertulia. A Catalyze Fellow, Desert Rat Resident, Open Mouth Fellow, and recipient of the Richard Stanley Cooper Literary Award, his work across books and design has been recognized by the American Library Association and the Library of Congress. He lives in Little Rock, Arkansas, with his husband, Bryan Borland.
Sarah M. Sala is the author of Devil’s Lake (Tolsun Books, 2020). She teaches writing at NYU, and despite the clear instructions on seed packets, she prefers chaos seeding her garden.
Scott Hightower has published five books of poetry in the U.S. and two bi-lingual collections in Madrid. A sixth stateside book, Lord of the Marsh, is slated for this Spring. He lives in Manhattan and teaches at the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at NYU.
Shea Vassar is a Cherokee writer and comedian based in Oklahoma. She dabbles in various creative mediums which utilize existentialism to look at Indigenous diaspora, connection to land, generational trauma, and the irony of being alive.
Born and raised in New York, Steve Turtell is a poet and writer whose 2012 collection Heroes and Householders was praised by critic Marjorie Perloff for its “subtle and charming poems.” As director of public programs at the Museum of the City of New York, the South Street Seaport Museum, and the New-York Historical Society, he oversaw the public programming for eighteen photography exhibitions — a role that underscored his deep engagement with the medium and its histories.
Sylvia Jones is the author of Television Fathers (Meekling Press, 2024) and Dope Calisthenics, forthcoming from Relegation Books this Fall. Jones serves as an editor for Black Lawrence Press and is a senior reader for Ploughshares. She lives and writes in Baltimore, Maryland.
Tova Greene (they/them) is a Brooklyn-based producer and poet-person. As the Chief Programs Officer of The Poetry Society of New York, they create immersive poetry wonderlands—such as The New York City Poetry Festival & Poetry Camp—that prioritize collaboration and artistic experimentation. Their events have garnered acclaim from outlets including The New York Times and Observer. Their debut collection, lilac on the damned's breath (Bottlecap Press, 2022), grapples with the cyclical nature of grief.
Tray Tsui is a Brooklyn-based queer artist, filmmaker, and writer whose work investigates the links and ruptures between mass culture, collective memory, and personal narrative. Utilizing autoethnography, performance, found footage appropriation, and narrative film production, Tray works to redress the problematic legacy of cinema as a medium that erases, distorts, and totalizes the experience of the "other."
Ghost Towns
A Gathering of the Tribes Presents Ghost Towns, an evening of poetry and performance curated by Tribes’ beloved international artist-in-residence Eva H.D. (poet, playwright, filmmaker) and features works by Diana Goetsch (poet, memoirist), Charlie Kaufman (writer, director), Tom Cole (writer, performance artist), Ariana Reines (poet, playwright, performance artist, translator) and Samantha Sea Sea (performance artist).
Ghost Towns—a gesture to the various iterations of our cities that we carry, their complicated histories, the shadows and wreckage they leave behind. The wreckage that becomes the infrastructure we ourselves haunt on our way to the next erasure. A toast to the ghosts that layer under and over the metropolis that embraces and / or abandons us today.
$5 Donation
An All Hallows Eve of Poetry
PLEASE JOIN US on FRIDAY, OCTOBER 31st for
An All Hallows Eve of Poetry
with Bakar Wilson + Irene Villaseñor.
$5 Donation | Open mic to follow featured poets!
6.45pm - Doors / Open Mic Sign up (5 min slots)
7.00pm - Featured Poets
8.00pm - Open Mic
Bakar Wilson has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Community of Writers, and the Colgate Writers’ Conference. He has performed his work at the Bowery Poetry Club, Poetry Project, The Studio Museum of Harlem, The Asian-American Writer's Workshop, and the Langston Hughes House, among others. His poetry has appeared in The Vanderbilt Review, The Lumberyard Radio Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, Flicker and Spark: A Contemporary Queer Anthology, and The Ostrich Review, among others. His debut collection of poetry titled, Daddy Show, was just published by Get Fresh Books. A native of Memphis, Tennessee, Bakar received his B.A. in English from Vanderbilt University and his M.A. in Creative Writing from The City College of New York. He is an Adjunct Lecturer of English and Creative Writing at Borough of Manhattan Community College at CUNY.
Irene Villaseñor (Aeta, Chinese, Ifugao, and Purepecha) explores bi-societal experiences, Indigeneity, injustice, care, and community-building. Her writing has appeared in Queer Nature: An Ecoqueer Poetry Anthology, Nepantla: An Anthology Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color, Nat. Brut, Yellow Medicine Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Cream City Review, and elsewhere. She's received support from Atlantic Center for the Arts, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, Lambda Literary, Lighthouse Writers Workshop, New York Foundation for the Arts, Santa Fe Art Institute, Tin House, VONA, and New York Foundation for the Arts. Irene read at the Whitney Biennial, Museum of the City of New York, Smack Mellon Gallery, the New Museum, and PARTICIPANT INC. Her poetry manuscript, Get Lost Colonizer: Erasures from the Future, was a runner-up for The Center for Book Arts' 2024 Annual Chapbook Contest.
The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 - AUG Workshop
WRITE BAD: POEMS THAT BREAK THE SILENCE
Facilitated by: Roya Marsh
This is a generative writing workshop, open to all skill levels.
$5 Donation.
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP
This workshop space will inspire writers to confront their fears and doubts with unapologetic courage and creativity. Write Bad is the space to be your most daring self and write the thing you’ve been running from. We will look at the work of Barbara Fant, Donte Collins and KB Brookins. Participants will be called to continue writing beyond the session, reminding them that the act of writing boldly is an ongoing practice. Courage is the most important tool in our writing toolkit.
ABOUT THE FACILITATOR
Bronx, New York native, Roya Marsh is a poet, performer, educator, and activist. She is the author of dayliGht, a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Poetry and SAVINGS TIME (MCDXFSG). Roya works feverishly toward Queer liberation and dismantling white supremacy. She is the co-founder of the Bronx Poet Laureate, a PEN America Emerging Voices Mentor, Lambda Literary faculty, and the awardee of the Lotos Foundation Prize for Poetry and the 2024 Bronx Recognizes Its Own (BRIO) Grant from Bronx Council on the Arts. Roya’s work has been featured widely including, The Academy of American Poets, Poetry Magazine, Electric Literature, the Village Voice, Nylon Magazine, Huffington Post, The Root, Button Poetry, BAM, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, The Apollo Theater, Joe’s Pub, Lexus Verses and Flow, On One with Angela Rye, BET and The BreakBeat Poets Vol 2: Black Girl Magic(Haymarket 2018).
THE STOOP PROJECT: SUMMER SERIES 2025
Hosted by A Gathering of the Tribes, The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 features a curated selection of generative writing workshops by bearded poet Thomas Fucaloro. Sessions are open to all skill levels and will be held in person every third Monday from June through August 2025 at The Center’s bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, in NYC. Each workshop will be led by a different facilitator and focus on a unique theme. A $5 donation reserves your spot — see calendar for all event listings.
In tandem with the workshops, each month Tribes will select a featured book from The Center’s Bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division.
THE HISTORY OF THE STOOP
The Stoop Poetry Workshop (1991–1995) was established and facilitated by Tribes’ founder Steve Cannon with fellow Lower East Side poet Bob Holman. Conceived on the stoop of Cannon’s East 3rd Street residence, the workshop served as a creative incubator held before the Nuyorican Poets Café’s Friday Night Slams — allowing poets to refine their work and perform it the same evening. An extraordinary roster of poets participated in the Workshop, including reg e. gaines, Edwin Torres, Tracie Morris, Dana Bryant, Mia Hansford, Keith Roach, Paul Beatty, Willie Perdomo, Dael Orlandersmith, Ed Morales, Ra, and Mike Tyler.
Building on Cannon’s ethos of “Each one, teach one,” The Stoop Project expands the original vision of the Workshop by inviting a wide array of guest facilitators to carry forward its spirit of collective growth, experimentation, and intergenerational exchange.
ABOUT THE CURATOR
The winner of numerous grants from the Staten Island Council of the Arts, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, NYC Office for the Prevention of Hate Crimes, and NYC Commission of Human Rights, to name a few. Thomas Fucaloro has been on six national slam teams. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the New School and is a co-founding editor of Great Weather for Media and NYSAI Press. He is an adjunct professor at Wagner College, BMCC, and CSI, where he teaches various poetry and literature courses. Thomas is the cofounder of Poetry in the Park, WORDPLAY, Creating Space, Poetry in Motion, and Creativity Meets Geek. Thomas has released 2 full-length albums: It Starts From the Belly and Blooms, and Inheriting Craziness is a Soft Halo of Light by Three Rooms Press. He also has 4 chapbooks: Mistakes Disguised as Stars (Tired Hearts Press), Depression Cupcakes (Yes, Poetry), There is Always Tomorrow (Mad Gleam Press), and The Only Gardening I Do is When I Give Up by Finishing Line Press. His new chapbook LE(t)GO is out by Neuronautic Press.
The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 - July workshop
NO SUCH THING AS WRITER’S BLOCK
Facilitated by: UGBA
This is a generative writing workshop, open to all skill levels.
$5 Donation
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP
In this session, I will be sharing tools gathered over my 15+ year career as a professional writer and writing-workshop facilitator to equip writers (both novice and veteran) with the confidence to quiet that little voice in their head that says: I've gone as far as I can. I haven't got anything left. It's a lie! There are always more words—sometimes you just need an instructor willing to teach you how to find them: I am that instructor!
ABOUT THE FACILITATOR
UGBA (‘oog ba’) Ungrateful Black Artist (pronoun inclusive) is a queer poet, rapper, playwright, actor, and activist based out of Brooklyn, NY. UGBA is the founder/host of CEREMONIES—a Brooklyn-based monthly Black-Queer artist showcase held in honor of Essex Hemphill. UGBA is also the founder of “Dark-Skin Support Group," a virtual support network for dark-skin Black Americans in need of a space to discuss the realities of colorism. In 2020, UGBA was named a “Black LGBTQ+ playwright you need to know '' by Time Out NY. UGBA is the former script assistant for the Pulitzer Prize-winning and 5 time TONY nominated Broadway show “Fat Ham." He is an alumnus of the Public Theater’s #BARS program and Emerging Writers Group 2020-2023 cohort. He is a 2023 Artivism Fellow through Broadway Advocacy Coalition, a 2022 MAP Grant recipient, a 2020-2021 BAM Resident, a New York Stage & Film 2023 Founders’ award recipient, and current Artistic Director at NY Writers Coalition.
THE STOOP PROJECT: SUMMER SERIES 2025
Hosted by A Gathering of the Tribes, The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 features a curated selection of generative writing workshops by bearded poet Thomas Fucaloro. Sessions are open to all skill levels and will be held in person every third Monday from June through August 2025 at The Center’s bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, in NYC. Each workshop will be led by a different facilitator and focus on a unique theme. A $5 donation reserves your spot — see calendar for all event listings.
In tandem with the workshops, each month Tribes will select a featured book from The Center’s Bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division.
THE HISTORY OF THE STOOP
The Stoop Poetry Workshop (1991–1995) was established and facilitated by Tribes’ founder Steve Cannon with fellow Lower East Side poet Bob Holman. Conceived on the stoop of Cannon’s East 3rd Street residence, the workshop served as a creative incubator held before the Nuyorican Poets Café’s Friday Night Slams — allowing poets to refine their work and perform it the same evening. An extraordinary roster of poets participated in the Workshop, including reg e. gaines, Edwin Torres, Tracie Morris, Dana Bryant, Mia Hansford, Keith Roach, Paul Beatty, Willie Perdomo, Dael Orlandersmith, Ed Morales, Ra, and Mike Tyler.
Building on Cannon’s ethos of “Each one, teach one,” The Stoop Project expands the original vision of the Workshop by inviting a wide array of guest facilitators to carry forward its spirit of collective growth, experimentation, and intergenerational exchange.
ABOUT THE CURATOR
The winner of numerous grants from the Staten Island Council of the Arts, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, NYC Office for the Prevention of Hate Crimes, and NYC Commission of Human Rights, to name a few. Thomas Fucaloro has been on six national slam teams. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the New School and is a co-founding editor of Great Weather for Media and NYSAI Press. He is an adjunct professor at Wagner College, BMCC, and CSI, where he teaches various poetry and literature courses. Thomas is the cofounder of Poetry in the Park, WORDPLAY, Creating Space, Poetry in Motion, and Creativity Meets Geek. Thomas has released 2 full-length albums: It Starts From the Belly and Blooms, and Inheriting Craziness is a Soft Halo of Light by Three Rooms Press. He also has 4 chapbooks: Mistakes Disguised as Stars (Tired Hearts Press), Depression Cupcakes (Yes, Poetry), There is Always Tomorrow (Mad Gleam Press), and The Only Gardening I Do is When I Give Up by Finishing Line Press. His new chapbook LE(t)GO is out by Neuronautic Press.
The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 - June Workshop
USING THE PERSONAL TO INVESTIGATE, COMPLICATE & REVEAL THE SOCIAL/POLITICAL
Facilitated by: Jeanann Verlee
This is a generative writing workshop, open to all skill levels. $5 Donation
ABOUT THE FACILITATOR
Jeanann Verlee is the author of three books: prey (finalist for the Benjamin Saltman Award), Said the Manic to the Muse, and Racing Hummingbirds (silver medal winner in the Independent Publisher Awards). She has received a National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship, the Third Coast Poetry Prize, and the Sandy Crimmins National Prize. Her poems and essays are featured in a number of journals, including Academy of American Poets, Adroit, BuzzFeed, Muzzle, and THRUSH. She served as poetry editor for Winter Tangerine Review and Union Station, among others, and has edited several award-winning books. She collects tattoos, kisses Rottweilers, and believes in you. Find her at jeanannverlee.com.
THE STOOP PROJECT: SUMMER SERIES 2025
Hosted by A Gathering of the Tribes, The Stoop Project: Summer Series 2025 features a curated selection of generative writing workshops by bearded poet Thomas Fucaloro. Sessions are open to all skill levels and will be held in person every third Monday from June through August 2025 at The Center’s bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division, in NYC. Each workshop will be led by a different facilitator and focus on a unique theme. A $5 donation reserves your spot — see calendar for all event listings.
In tandem with the workshops, each month Tribes will select a featured book from The Center’s Bookstore, Bureau of General Services—Queer Division.
THE HISTORY OF THE STOOP
The Stoop Poetry Workshop (1991–1995) was established and facilitated by Tribes’ founder Steve Cannon with fellow Lower East Side poet Bob Holman. Conceived on the stoop of Cannon’s East 3rd Street residence, the workshop served as a creative incubator held before the Nuyorican Poets Café’s Friday Night Slams — allowing poets to refine their work and perform it the same evening. An extraordinary roster of poets participated in the Workshop, including reg e. gaines, Edwin Torres, Tracie Morris, Dana Bryant, Mia Hansford, Keith Roach, Paul Beatty, Willie Perdomo, Dael Orlandersmith, Ed Morales, Ra, and Mike Tyler.
Building on Cannon’s ethos of “Each one, teach one,” The Stoop Project expands the original vision of the Workshop by inviting a wide array of guest facilitators to carry forward its spirit of collective growth, experimentation, and intergenerational exchange.
ABOUT THE CURATOR
The winner of numerous grants from the Staten Island Council of the Arts, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, NYC Office for the Prevention of Hate Crimes, and NYC Commission of Human Rights, to name a few. Thomas Fucaloro has been on six national slam teams. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the New School and is a co-founding editor of Great Weather for Media and NYSAI Press. He is an adjunct professor at Wagner College, BMCC, and CSI, where he teaches various poetry and literature courses. Thomas is the cofounder of Poetry in the Park, WORDPLAY, Creating Space, Poetry in Motion, and Creativity Meets Geek. Thomas has released 2 full-length albums: It Starts From the Belly and Blooms, and Inheriting Craziness is a Soft Halo of Light by Three Rooms Press. He also has 4 chapbooks: Mistakes Disguised as Stars (Tired Hearts Press), Depression Cupcakes (Yes, Poetry), There is Always Tomorrow (Mad Gleam Press), and The Only Gardening I Do is When I Give Up by Finishing Line Press. His new chapbook LE(t)GO is out by Neuronautic Press.
A Gathering of Our Pride: A Marathon of Queer Poetry
A GATHERING OF OUR PRIDE 2025 is part of a larger festival, FIND YOUR STORY…WRITING WITH PIRDE which takes place from 10.00 AM - 5.30 PM at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington DC and includes a full day of readings, workshops, and panels from DC's LGBTQ literary community.
FIND YOUR STORY will be a day of workshops, presentations, and author talks focused on DC’s writing community. For World Pride 2025, the event will have a special focus on LGBTQ writers in the DC area. The day will include panel discussions, informal writing workshops, and a dedicated poetry stage.
In addition to the marathon reading hosted by Tribes, here are two other notable events:
10:00 AM - 11:00 AM - RAINBOW ARCHIPELIGOS OF QUEER RESISTANCE DURING THESE COLONIZING TIMES: A QUEER FILIPINO PANEL AND WORKSHOP
https://dclibrary.libnet.info/event/13581012
DC's Liwanag DC Filipino Book Festival organizers and Queer Poets perform poems of the ever evolving struggle to come out as queer, bisexual, non-binary and how their lives are impacted during the current administration. First Floor Stage
10:00 AM - 12:00 PM - A GATHERING OF OUR PRIDE - A MARATHON POETRY READING
https://dclibrary.libnet.info/event/13581949
Regie Cabico, the Fairy Godmother of Spoken Word, and Kim Roberts, the premier literary historian of DC, curate and host fourteen LGBTQ+ poets from the greater DC region as they share poetry of love and resilience. Join us in the afternoon for a book fair featuring small local presses and an open mic. Fifth Floor Poetry Stage
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM - OPEN MIC AND LOCAL PRESS FAIR
https://dclibrary.libnet.info/event/13742336
Celebrate the community of independent presses and publishers in the DC area amplifying the voices of LGBTQ writers with a press fair and open mic featuring their work. Fifth Floor Poetry Stage
All events are free and open to the public.
Please check individual event listings for age levels.
Segue Reading Series Fall 2024 - Featuring Joan Larkin + Malcom Tariq
Please join us on Saturday, October 5th, 2024 @ 5pm sharp for the inaugural installment of Segue Reading Series Fall 2024, featuring performances by acclaimed poets Joan Larkin and Malcom Tariq.
The Segue Reading Series Fall 2024 is produced by the Segue Foundation and curated by the talented Regie Cabico and Drew Pisarra of A Gathering of the Tribes. This vibrant series will unfold over eight consecutive Saturdays from October 5th to November 23rd. Experience an eclectic mix of voices and styles as we celebrate the power of literature and storytelling. Don’t miss this opportunity to immerse yourself in the literary arts!
Tickets are $5 in-person and virtual (all proceeds go to the readers).
Location: Artists Space, 11 Cortlandt Alley, New York, NY, 10013
Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89395947519
THE POETS
Joan Larkin’s newest book, "Old Stranger," is her sixth collection of poems. Previous titles include "My Body: New and Selected Poems," winner of the Publishing Triangle’s Audre Lorde award. A lifelong teacher and poet, she has recently begun publishing short fiction.
Malcolm Tariq is a poet and playwright from Savannah. He is the author of "Heed the Hollow," winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, and the 2020 Georgia Author of the Year Award in Poetry. He lives in Brooklyn and is the senior editorial manager for PEN America's Prison and Justice Writing Program.
THE CURATORS
Regie Cabico, a spoken word pioneer and current Executive Director of A Gathering of the Tribes, won the Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. His TV credits include HBO’s "Def Poetry Jam," TEDx and NPR’s "Snap Judgment." His first full-length poetry collection "A Rabbit in Search of a Rolex" was released by Day Eight in 2023.
Drew Pisarra is the author of two short story collections, "You’re Pretty Gay" (2021) and "Publick Spanking" (1996), two sonnet collections, "Infinity Standing Up" (2019) and "Periodic Boyfriends" (2023); and two radio plays, "The Strange Case of Nick M." (2021) and "Price in Purgatory" (2023).
SEGUE FOUNDATION
The Segue Foundation is an internationally-renowned arts organization based in New York City with a history of commitment to innovative literature, film, and dance. Segue sponsors the experimental Segue Reading Series, a legendary series that has run continuously in New York City for over 40 years.
A Gathering of the Tribes continued programming made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature
James Baldwin’s 100th Birthday Slam
Please join us at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC as we celebrate the eve of James Baldwin’s 100th Birthday with poets and readings by writers who have performed for us in Gathering Fire, a co-curated event between Capturing Fire and AGathering of the Tribes.
RSVP here: https://npg.si.edu/event/james-baldwin’s-100th-birthday-slam
Cloud Nine: A Launch Party for "Groove, Bang and Jive Around"
Blank Forms is thrilled to announce their republication of Steve Cannon's long out-of-print, underground classic “Groove, Bang and Jive Around” in a stunning new paperback.
Order your copy here, only $15!
https://www.blankforms.org/publications/steve-cannon-groove-bang-and-jive-around
Please join A Gathering of the Tribes for an evening of readings and performances celebrating this notorious novel at the upcoming book launch!!
Free and open to the public! RSVP via the link: https://withfriends.co/event/20327441/cloud_nine_a_launch_party_for_groove_bang_and_jive_around
Tribes Spotlight Series December 2021
Please join us for a very Special Edition of Tribes Spotlight Series, featuring our amazing editors who will be sharing their work, hosted by Chavisa Woods.
This is event is FREE and open to the public.
To attend, simply open this Zoom link at 7pm EST on Thursday, September 2nd! :
You can also dial in and listen by phone: 1-646-558-8656
FEATURED GUESTS
Tribes’ Associate Poetry Editor Sheila Maldonado is the author of the poetry collections one-bedroom Solo (A Gathering of the Tribes / Fly by Night Press, 2011) and that's what you get (Brooklyn Arts Press, forthcoming, 2020). Her poems have appeared in Gulf Coast, Ping Pong, and Callaloo, and anthologized in Bettering American Poetry Vol. 3, The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNext, Brooklyn Poets Anthology and The Wandering Song: Central American Writing in the United States. She is a CantoMundo Fellow and a Creative Capital awardee as part of desveladas, a visual writing collective. She has served as an artist-in-residence on Governors Island, New York for the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and a Cultural Envoy to Honduras for the U.S. State Department. She teaches English for The City University of New York and has led residencies as a teaching artist for the National Book Foundation and Teachers & Writers Collaborative. She has degrees in English from Brown University and creative writing / poetry from The City College of New York. She was born in Brooklyn and raised in Coney Island. Her family hails from Honduras. She lives in uptown Manhattan where she is working on an ongoing project about a lifelong obsession with the ancient Maya.
Tribes’ Associate Poetry Editor Danny Shot was the longtime publisher and editor of Long Shot arts and literary magazine, which he founded along with Eliot Katz in 1982 in New Brunswick, NJ. Born in the Bronx and raised in Dumont, NJ by German Jewish refugees, Danny graduated Rutgers College in 1980 with a B.A. in English. Shot’s poetry has appeared in: bum rush the page (Def Poetry Jam) Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe (Henry Holt), and The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (Thunder’s Mouth) among other anthologies and numerous journals. Shot has read his poetry throughout the United States. He was featured on the television show State of the Arts, NJ in July 2018. His play Roll the Dice, co-written with Lawrence Kelly was performed at the NYC Theater Summerfest in September 2018. Danny is currently Head Poetry Editor of Red Fez, an online magazine (www.redfez.net). He spent over 30 years as a NYC public high school teacher, serving in the South Bronx, Harlem and Brooklyn. Mr. Shot lives in Hoboken, NJ (home of Frank Sinatra and baseball) where he was the most recent poet-in-residence of the Hoboken Museum. WORKS (New and Selected Poems) was published in March 2018 (CavanKerry Press).
Tribes’ Head Poetry Editor Quincy Troupe is the author of 20 books, including 10 volumes of poetry and three children’s books. His awards include the Paterson Award for Sustained Literary Achievement, the 2003 Milt Kessler Poetry Award, The 2005 Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Award presented by Poets & Writers, three American Book Awards, the 2014 Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Award and a 2014 Lifetime Achievement Award from Furious Flowers. His writings have been translated into over 30 languages and, in 2002 he was named the first official Poet Laureate of the State of California. Troupe’s latest books of poems are; Seduction; a book length poem titled, Ghost Voices, published in 2018; Errancities (2012) and Transcircularities: New and Selected Poems (2002). Mr. Troupe is co-author with Miles Davis of Miles: the Autobiography; Earl the Pearl with Earl Monroe; and the author of Miles and me, a memoir of his friendship with Miles Davis, published in 2018 by Seven Stories Press. Forthcoming are a large book of poems, Duende, Poems, 1966 – Now, scheduled for publication in March 2021 and a memoir, The Accordion Years, scheduled to be published in Fall 2021, also by Seven Stories Press. Troupe is Professor Emeritus from the University of California, San Diego, edits Black Renaissance Noire at New York University and lives in Harlem, New York with his wife, Margaret.
Tribes Spotlight Series November 2021
Please join us for Tribes Spotlight Series, featuring four amazing authors sharing their work, hosted by Chavisa Woods.
This is event is FREE and open to the public.
To attend, simply open this Zoom link at 7pm EST on Thursday, September 2nd! :
You can also dial in and listen by phone: 1-646-558-8656
FEATURED GUESTS
Ishmael Reed is a poet, novelist, essayist, playwright, songwriter, public media commentator, lecturer and publisher. Author of more than thirty books, Dalkey Archive Press published his eleventh novel, Conjugating Hindi, in 2018. In 2020, his latest non-fiction work, Malcolm and Me, was published by Audible, with Reed as narrator. Baraka Books of Montreal published his latest essay collection, Why No Confederate Statues in Mexico, in 2019. Why the Black Hole Sings the Blues, his most recent poetry collection, is forthcoming in 2020 by Dalkey Archive Press. Other recent books include his tenth novel, Juice! (2011); and The Complete Muhammad Ali (Baraka Books, 2015). New York’s Nuyorican Poets Café premiered his ninth and newest play, The Haunting of Lin-Manuel Miranda, May 23, 2019, which garnered three 2019 AUDELCO awards; the Nuyorican produced his eighth play, Life Among the Aryans in 2018. Reed is founder of the Before Columbus Foundation and PEN Oakland, non-profit organizations run by writers for writers. He is a MacArthur Fellow, and among his other honors are the University of Buffalo’s 2014 Distinguished Alumni Award, National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize nominations, and a Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Award. Awarded the 2008 Blues Songwriter of the Year from the West Coast Blues Hall of Fame, his collaborations with jazz musicians for the past forty years were also recognized by SFJazz Center with his appointment, from 2012-2016, as San Francisco’s first Jazz Poet Laureate and in Venice, Italy, where he became the first Alberto Dubito International awardee, honored as “a special artistic individual who has distinguished himself through the most innovative creativity in the musical and linguistic languages.” Reed is currently working on The Terrible Fours, the third novel in his “Terribles” trilogy. His online international literary magazine, Konch, can be found at www.ishmaelreedpub.com. His author website is located at www.ishmaelreedpub.org.
Nancy Mercado was named one of 200 living individuals who best embody the work and spirit of Frederick Douglass on the bicentennial of his birth by the Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives and the Antiracist Research and Policy Center at American University. She is the recipient of the 2017 American Book Award for Lifetime Achievement presented by the Before Columbus Foundation. In December 2020, Mercado edited a special memorial section for Tribes honoring Miguel Algarin, founder of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. She is the editor of the first Nuyorican women writers anthology published in Voices e/Magazine from the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, Hunter College- CUNY, and serves as a guest curator for the Museum of American Poetics. Featured on National Public Radio’s All of It, The Talk of the Nation, and the PBS NewsHour Special; America Remembers 9/11, she is the author of It Concerns the Madness (2000), a poetry collection, Las Tres Hermanas (2017), a children’s coloring book, and the editor of if the world were mine (2009), a young adult anthology. Currently, Mercado is editing another special memorial section for Boog City honoring Miguel Algarin. For more information visit: https://www.nancy-mercado.com
reg e gaines is a poet, playwright, director, lecturer and Artistic Director of the Downtown Urban Arts Festival in New York City since 2007. He is a two time Tony Award nominated playwright, Grammy nominated lyricist, ( Bring in da Noise/ Bring in da Funk) and author of four books of poetry including, Abstract Sax and The Original Buckwheat. A former Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam Champ, reg appears in numerous poetry anthologies including, Bum Rush The Page, Paterson Literary Review, Aloud: Voices From The Nuyorican Poets Cafe, and A Year in Ink. He has composed the score for the PBS documentary, Senior Year and has released four poetry albums. reg has appeared on seasons 3-4 of HBO’s Def Poetry Jam as well as the Arsenio Hall Show, the John Stewart Show, MTV Spoken Word Unplugged and MSNBC’s Edgewise. He has performed at Woodstock ‘94, Central Park SummerStage, The Berlin Jazz Festival, Carre Opera House in Amsterdam, Aaron Davis Hall, the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and NYU’s Gallatin Center. reg is currently writing and directing The 88, a musical with music composed by Calvin Gaines.
Zarrin Ferdowsi was born in Iran and finished high-school right around the aftermath of Islamic revolution of Iran. Growing up in the family with love of literature, read any books she could get her hands on due to difficulty to attend college in her birth country she Immigrated to united states in 1986 and worked her way through many years till finally finished her bachelor's degree in molecular cell biology at the University of California in Berkeley. Followed with a professional degree in dentistry from the University of Washington in Seattle. She is married with one son and she lives and practices in East Bay San Francisco for twenty years.
Tribes Spotlight Series September 2021
Please join us for Tribes Spotlight Series, featuring four amazing authors sharing their work, hosted by Chavisa Woods.
This is event is FREE and open to the public.
More Info Coming Soon! Save the Date.
To attend, simply open this Zoom link at 7pm EST on Thursday, September 2nd! :
You can also dial in and listen by phone: 1-646-558-8656
FEATURED GUESTS
Daphne Gottlieb stitches together the ivory tower and the gutter just using her tongue. She is the author of 10 other books including the short stories Pretty Much Dead. Other works include Dear Dawn, letters from Death Row by the “first female serial killer”, Aileen Wuornos. She lives in San Francisco, where tries to help the casualties of the city’s class war.
Bakar Wilson has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, and the Colgate Writers’ Conference. He has performed his work at the Bowery Poetry Club, Poetry Project, The Studio Museum of Harlem, The Asian-American Writer's Workshop, and the Langston Hughes House, among others. His poetry has appeared in The Vanderbilt Review, The Lumberyard Radio Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, Flicker and Spark: A Contemporary Queer Anthology, The Ostrich Review, and thekenyonreview.org, among others. A native of Memphis, Tennessee, Bakar received his B.A. in English from Vanderbilt University and his M.A. in Creative Writing from The City College of New York. He is an Adjunct Lecturer of English and Creative Writing at Borough of Manhattan Community College at CUNY.
Barbara Purcell is an arts and culture writer based in Austin, TX. Her work has appeared in Texas Monthly, the Brooklyn Rail, the Austin Chronicle, Canadian Art, and Glasstire, among others. Her fiction has appeared in Tribes Magazine, Door is a Jar, and Schuylkill Valley Journal. She is the author of Black Ice: Poems (Fly by Night Press, 2006) and has contributed to three anthologies: Heide Hatry: Heads and Tales, Yoga—Philosophy for Everyone: Bending Mind and Body, and Word: An Anthology by a Gathering of the Tribes. She is a graduate of Skidmore College.
Peggy Robles-Alvarado is a Dominican and Puerto Rican Pushcart Prize nominee, 2020 Atticus Review Poetry Contest winner, and a BRIO award winner with fellowships from CantoMundo, Desert Nights Rising Stars, The Frost Place, and VONA. With degrees in education and an MFA in Performance Studies this former teen mother, and initiated priestess in Lukumi and Palo celebrates womanhood and honors cultural rituals. She’s a three-time International Latino Book Award winner who authored Conversations With My Skin (2011), and Homage To The Warrior Women (2012). Through Robleswrites Productions, shecreated The Abuela Stories Project (2016) and Mujeres, The Magic, The Movement, and The Muse (2017). Her work has been featured on HBO Habla Women, Lincoln Center, and her poetry appears in several anthologies including The Breakbeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNext (2020), and What Saves Us: Poems of Empathy and Outrage in the Age of Trump (2019).
Gathering Fire QL
A Gathering of the Tribes and Capturing Fire join forces to present, Gathering Fire QL,(Queer Literature/Liberation) a special live reading during Pride season. Six featured authors will share their original work followed by an hour-long open mic.
Open mic sign up will begin promptly at 6pm, and last be available for 30 minutes. We ask open readers to keep their work to three minutes or less.
This event will be live as well as virtual, held at The Bowery Poetry Club, and live-streamed on Tribes social media. We invite vaccinated audience members to attend in-person, following NYC social-distancing COVID safety protocols, and all others to attend online.
Gathering Fire will be a 90-minute event celebrating the history of queer liberation, and literature, featuring contemporary queer voices, curated by Regie Cabico (Master of Ceremonies) and Chavisa Woods. The space has been generously provided by The Bowery Poetry Club.
We look forward to seeing you there!
Tribes Spotlight Series (May 2021)
Please join us for Tribes Spotlight Series, featuring four amazing authors sharing their work, hosted by Chavisa Woods.
This is event is FREE and open to the public.
More Info Coming Soon! Save the Date.
To attend, simply open this Zoom link at 7pm EST on Thursday, March 11th:
You can also dial in and listen by phone: 1-646-558-8656
FEATURED GUESTS
Eva H.D. is the author of Rotten Perfect Mouth, which includes the pieces "38 Michigans," & "Bonedog" (featured in the Netflix film, I'm Thinking of Ending Things). She works in your favourite bar.
Wanda Phipps is a writer/translator/editor living in NYC. Her books include Field of Wanting: Poems of Desire and Wake-Up Calls: 66 Morning Poems. Her poetry has been translated into Ukrainian, Hungarian, Arabic, Galician and Bangla. She's received awards from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the National Theater Translation Fund, and others. As a founding member of Yara Arts Group she has collaborated on numerous theatrical productions presented in Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Siberia, and at La MaMa, E.T.C. in NYC. She’s curated reading series at the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church and written about the arts for Time Out New York, and Paper Magazine. Her new book Mind Honey is forthcoming from Autonomedia.. Her books are available here:
CAConrad has been working with the ancient technologies of poetry and ritual since 1975. They are the author of Amanda Paradise (Wave Books, 2021). Other titles include The Book of Frank, While Standing in Line for Death, and Ecodeviance. They received a Creative Capital grant, a Pew Fellowship, a Lambda Literary Award, and a Believer Magazine Book Award. They teach at Columbia University in New York City and Sandberg Art Institute in Amsterdam.
Gbenga Adesina, winner of the 2020 Narrative Prize, is a Nigerian writer and the author of the chapbook Painter of Water, a meditation on intimacy in the face of historical violence, published in the New Generation African Poets series by the University of Nebraska and Akashic Books. He has received fellowships and scholarships from The Fine Arts Work Center, Poets House New York, New York University (where he received his MFA), and Colgate University. His work has been published in the New York Times, Prairie Schooner, Washington Square Review, and elsewhere
Tribes Spotlight Series (March 2021)
Please join us for Tribes Spotlight Series, featuring four amazing authors sharing their work, hosted by Chavisa Woods.
This is event is FREE and open to the public.
More Info Coming Soon! Save the Date.
To attend, simply open this Zoom link at 7pm EST on Thursday, March 11th:
You can also dial in and listen by phone: 1-646-558-8656
FEATURED GUESTS
Patricia Spears Jones is a poet, writer, editor, literary curator and activist. She is author of A LUCENT FIRE and 9 other poetry collections and two plays commissioned by Mabou Mines. She is the 2017 Jackson Poetry Prize recipient. She is an emeritus fellow for Black Earth institute and organizer of American Poets Congress.
Yuko Otomo is a visual artist & a bilingual poet/writer of Japanese origin. She writes poetry; haiku; art criticism; travelogues & essays. Her publications include Garden: Selected Haiku(Beehive Press), Genesis (Sisyphus Press), Small Poems (Ugly Duckling Presse), The Hand of The Poet (UDP), STUDY & Other Poems on Art (UDP), Elements (Feral Press), KOAN (New Feral Press) & FROZEN HEATWAVE: a poetry collaboration project with Steve Dalachinksy(Luna Bisonte Prods). She lives in New York City.
Lydia Cortés is the author of the poetry collections Lust for Lust and Whose Place. Her work has also been published in various anthologies such as Puerto Rican Poetry From Aboriginal Times to the Present, Resist Much, Obey Little and online forums as What Rough Beast (Indolent Books) and Upstreet Journal. In November 2O19, together with Julio Marzan and other poets, she was invited by Pen Puerto Rico to participate as a panelist in a Dialogue on Boricua Poets in New York. She is a MacDowell fellow and also was awarded at VCCA and Valparaiso in Andalusia Spain.
reg e gaines is a two time Tony Award nominated playwright and Grammy Award nominated lyricist. He has published four books of poetry, is editor of the 2015 poetry anthology, A Year In Ink, scored the PBS documentary, Senior Year and has served as artistic director of the NYC Downtown Urban Arts Festival since 2007. Recent projects include, director of Connect The Lots, a musical theater summer camp in Camden, New Jersey in 2014, director/ creative writing workshop facilitator of Through The Looking Glass, Center Theater Group, Los Angeles California, 2014-2016, director of Lyricist Fellowship Lab, Teaching Firm of America Charter School, Bedford Stuyvesant Brooklyn, winter/spring 2017, Is Poetry Theater? workshop facilitator, Bowery Poetry Club, NYC 2018 and writer, director, producer, The 88, a new musical with music by Calvin Gaines, 2020.