NO CRYING IN THE GARDEN BOOK LAUNCH & READING

2021 14th Street Northwest,Washington DC 20009

15 October, 2021

Description

Join us for the release of Michelle Dominique Burk's debut collection of poetry, NO CRYING IN THE GARDEN! Join us for the release of NO CRYING IN THE GARDEN by Michelle Dominique Burk ( October 15th, 2021 - $16.00) Available now for pre-order through Barnes&Noble Booksellers and michelledominiqueburk.com. NO CRYING IN THE GARDEN This debut collection, nearly 10 years in the making, traces the complicated relationship between fathers and their daughters, the frustrations inherent in being a young, black woman in predominantly white spaces, racism in the South and Midwest, and the magic of DJ Screw. A semi-autobiographical account of the writer's early adolescence and young adulthood living and moving throughout different cities including Washington D.C., Chicago, New York City, and Houston, NO CRYING IN THE GARDEN blurs the lines between the expected and the extraordinary. This debut collection is instantly epic in its ambition, its language, and most importantly, its imagination. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Michelle Dominique Burk received her MFA in Poetry from Columbia University in 2016 and her PhD from the University of Houston's Literature & Creative Writing Program in 2020, during the height of the global pandemic. Her work deals with the intersections of Critical Race Studies and popular culture. In addition to her roles as an activist and scholar, Michelle has received numerous awards for her writing and her work in English education reform. She is the recipient of The 2019 Award for Excellence in Teaching from the University of Houston, a Narrative Magazine "30 Below" prize winner, and a 2021 Houston Poet Laureate Finalist. Her poems and essays have appeared in many publications including Narrative Magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and Literary Hub. As of July 2021, Michelle teaches English and Advanced Creative Writing at The Field School in Washington D.C. She is currently working on a socio-cultural archival project called the Gentle Blackness Project which seeks to capture and showcase the beauty, grace, and excellence of African-American photography and artifacts in an effort to interrogate inaccurate depictions of black culture in K-12 history textbooks. CONTACT/FOLLOW MICHELLE DOMINIQUE BURK: Instagram/Twitter - @mmmilleniaaa OR @gentleblacknessprojectEmail - [email protected] DETAILS ****This event is free and open to all through RSVP on the Eventbrite page- there is limited space to observe COVID-19 social distancing in the Langston Room at Busboys and Poets of 14th & V. This event will not be livestreamed****