THEMS. PHX FRUITY POETRY NIGHT + OPEN MIC at the McKINLEY CLUB

(he/they) is a gamer and Hip-Hop nerd, whose only wish in this world is to watch an unproblematic, Black sci-fi T.V. show. Till then, Medlin teaches creative writing on the side while guiding artistic and cultural work for various organizations across the state of Arizona. Their dream is to create rap, poetry, prose and performance full-time. Their music, literature, and theater all question the limits of Black masculinity, media (mis)representation, and personal narrative.

Medlin’s work has been featured in Phoenix New Times, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Review of Books, Teen Vogue, Afropunk, Blavity, the 2018-2019 Chicago Hip-Hop Theater Festival, and the 2020 Tucson Poetry Festival. Their Hip-Hop play and album, skinnyblk, along with all their previous work, is available online at superseanavery.com. 808s & Otherworlds: Memories, Remixes, & Mythologies is Medlin’s debut collection of essays and poetry, published by Two Dollar Radio, available in audio, digital, and print everywhere books are sold in the U.S., the U.K., and Canada. You can follow them on Instagram @skinnyblksean.

(they/them) is a Black, queer, gender-infinite parent, poet, teacher, and cultural studies scholar. Their poetry has appeared in various journals and anthologies and their critical writing, including the essay “Dear Trans Studies, Can You Do Love?,” has appeared in Transgender Studies Quarterly, Ethnic and Racial Studies, and Families in Society. Ian-Khara is a Cave Canem fellow, recipient of the New Millennium Award for Poetry, and finalist for the National Poetry Series 2024 competition. Proudly hailing from Memphis, Ian-Khara has also loved living and writing in Tucson, Brooklyn, and now southern Maine, where they teach Gender and Sexuality Studies and Africana at Bates College.

(they/he) is a Black queer nonbinary Pushcart Prize-nominated poet, interdisciplinary scholar, and sjw, born and raised in Flint, MI. They are the winner of the Betty Stuart Smith Award from the University of Illinois Chicago, where they recently received their PhD in English with concentrations in Black Studies and Gender & Women's Studies. He received an MFA from Northern Michigan University and he was a Quarterfinalist in the 5th Annual Screencraft Screenwriting Fellowship, often claiming to have been born with a poem written across his chest. He spends much of his free time gaming and he plays a mean hand of spades. They recently served as the 2024 Editor-in-Chief at The Seventh Wave Magazine to curate a folio of creative writing and art focused on the video game genre, and their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Foglifter Journal, wildness, Scalawag, Four Way Review, Obsidian, and the anthology A Garden of Black Joy: Global Poetry from the Edges of Liberation and Living, among others. You can find him on Instagram at @deziree.the.writer.