We added a virtual panel to the schedule last month with the Socially Engaged Yoga Network alongside Damon Williams, Noha Arafa, and Peregrine Bermas, discussing the connections between healing justice and abolition. We also wanted to highlight that “Trans Bodies Trans Selves: Second Addition”—in which we co-wrote a chapter with Kung Feng—is now available from Oxford University Press. Get your copy directly from the publisher, or from your local bookstore.

We’ll start off the month by teaching a special Intro to Prison Abolition workshop in honor of Juneteenth for Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, underlining that slavery is not abolished until the police and prison systems are as well. We’ll lead a professional development session for instructors at After School Matters, and a Linking Anti-Blackness & Anti-Immigration workshop for elders at STOP Chicago—our new neighbors! And finally we’ll facilitate our first-ever session for a program of SisterSong called Mothering in Abundance—led by our sibling! There we will teach a Poetry Writing workshop focused on the program’s core themes of reproductive justice, and the complex shapes that mothering takes for trans, nonbinary, and queer parents and caregivers.

In literary news, 826CHI’s Storyfest will take place on June 4th. Youth from all over the city will be sharing their published writing, and the poetry anthology by students of Chicago Math and Science Academy for which we wrote the introduction will officially drop. We’re also pleased to announce that we’ve accepted a position as an artistic fellow with Young Chicago Authors! For the next 3 months we will be meeting regularly with YCA instructors, supporting them in deepening their craft, and thinking through the next stages of their own careers as teaching artists. We’re honored and excited.

Next month will be the first installment of the Black Performance Exchange between artists in Chicago and San Juan that we’ve been prepping for the last few months. A lot is going to be happening, so check back here for info on all the Chicago-side events!

BH