Poetry Readings & Open Mic

The Chicago Poetry Center and The Green at 320 are proud to reintroduce this free, weekly reading and open mic series co-curated by Chicago Poetry Center’s Poets in Residence Tarnynon Onumonu and Timothy David Rey.

Join us on certain Monday nights in June at 6:00 p.m. in this beautiful setting to hear outstanding featured poets perform their work in this partnership between Chicago Poetry Center and The Green at 320 S. Canal. After every poetry performance, there will be an open mic for any individual that would like to share poetry of their own!

June 12: Nile Lansana is an interdisciplinary artist from the South Side of Chicago. An acclaimed writer, poet, performer, and filmmaker, his work is centered around revealing radical truths and amplifying marginalized voices and narratives through a lens of Black imagination and visionary intention. He was a nominee for the inaugural Chicago Poet Laureate position. A University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate with degrees in Journalism and English – Creative Writing, he won the 2021 Ronald Wallace Poetry Thesis Prize and 2020 George B. Hill Poetry Prize. His work is published in American Gun: A Poem by 100 Chicagoans, The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop, & elsewhere. He holds fellowships from the Rebuild Foundation and Obsidian Foundation. He has performed across the country, including Lollapalooza and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He recently starred in the play “No Blue Memories: The Life of Gwendolyn Brooks” produced by Manual Cinema. He is a proud uncle and the oldest of four Black boys. You can follow him on Instagram at @nilesupasuit.

ABOUT THE CO-CURATORS:
Tarnynon (Ty-yuh-nuh) Onumonu is an artist and licensed Paraprofessional born and raised in the Jeffery Manor neighborhood on the southeast side of Chicago and is extremely proud of and humbled by her SouthSide citizenship and West African lineage. In 2017, she took second place in the Gwendolyn Brooks Open Mic Awards and represented Chicago on the Lethal Poetry Team at the 2018 National Poetry Slam. She has been a Poet in Residence at the Chicago Poetry Center since January of 2019 and has been featured in Newcity Magazine and South Side Weekly. Her “Darker Girl Manifesto” Broadside was on exhibition with the Center for Book Arts in the summer of 2021 and in April of 2022, she was commissioned by the environmental justice organization, the NRDC for National Poetry Month 2022. Her EP, “Brown Liquor on a Slow Sip” is available and streaming on all platforms as she compiles her first poetry collection.

Timothy David Rey is a writer/performer who works in poetry, plays, and monologue (both fictional and autobiographical). He teaches creative writing and performance throughout the city of Chicago and its suburbs. He is a 2015 Semi-Finalist for the Guild Literary Complex’s Gwendolyn Brooks Open Mic Poetry Award, and one of the winners of Project Exploration (The Poetry Center of Chicago 2004). He is the co-founder of the LBGT Solo Performance Showcase, Solo Homo (2002-2011). Timothy’s plays and performance pieces have been seen and heard at venues throughout Chicago as well as out of state and in Panama. Timothy’s writing has appeared in magazines and journals including ’60 Inches From Center,’ and ‘After Hours: The Chicago Journal of Writing & Art.’ ‘His book of poetry and performance, Little Victories, was published in 2012 by NewTown Writers Press. Timothy has performed at Steppenwolf Theater (Lookout Series), New York City’s International Fringe Festival as well as The Kennedy Center For The Performing Arts.