Reading Party: Danez Smith

United States Artists is thrilled to host an afternoon reading party and community reception featuring Danez Smith, a 2021 USA Fellow.

Danez Smith will be reading work from two works-in-progress, About Time, coming out in 2027 with Graywolf Press, and Like Mildew, a long poem celebrating the audacity and brilliance of Black men. Both works are new entries to what Smith now sees as “an archive of love that their work has come to embody.”

Danez Smith is the author of four collections including Don’t Call Us Dead, Homie, and most recently Bluff, a finalist for the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry. They are also the curator of Blues In Stereo: The Early Works of Langston Hughes. For their work, Danez won the Forward Prize for Best Collection, the Minnesota Book Award in Poetry (twice), the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry, and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and has been a finalist for the NAACP Image Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the National Book Award. Danez is a proud Black, Queer, HIV-Positive poet who writes from those intersections about love, community, pleasure, politics, mental health, our responsibility to the future, and all the shimmering, complex things that make us human. Danez lives in the Twin Cities with their people and teaches at the Randolph College MFA program and the Black Youth Healing Arts Center in St. Paul, MN.

About United States Artists: United States Artists plays a pivotal role in America’s cultural ecosystem, advancing the well-being of artists through unrestricted funding and tailored professional services, amplifying artists’ work, and improving conditions that support their essential roles in society.

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