Poetics of Liberation: A Reading and Community Gathering

Poetics of Liberation is an intersectional feminist reading and community gathering celebrating radical and queer writers whose work inspires social transformation. Hosted at The Count's Den—a stunning, vampiresque theater in the heart of Downtown Los Angeles—we are thrilled to feature Amanda Johnston, heidi andrea restrepo rhodes, mónica teresa ortiz, m. mick powell, Lily Someson, Stephanie Niu, Cloud Delfina Cardona, Jae Nichelle, Tala Khanmalek, Ari Kelly, Em Palughi, and Anel I. Flores.

Hosted by Host Publications editors Annar Veröld-Miranda & Claire Bowman!

*********************** ❤ ************************

This event is in partnership with Immersive Art Collective (IAC)—a Los Angeles-based 501(c)(3) that strives to create and support arts programs, events, and initiatives rooted in diversity, equity, and inclusion.

✦ Free & open to all lovers of literature.

✦ This reading will feature literary-themed handcrafted mocktails for purchase and free snacks.

✦ Health and safety note: masks are encouraged and will be provided.

Info: Tala Khanmalek (all pronouns) is a queer disabled writer, scholar, and editor of SWANA descent. Their work appears or is forthcoming in Meridian, Indiana Review, Zoeglossia, The Seventh Wave, Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, and beyond. Tala and heidi andrea restrepo rhodes are collaborators on a Creative Capital Award winning project entitled Vital Signs.

Info: heidi andrea restrepo rhodes is a neuroqueer, gender fluid, crip/disabled, brown, writer, artist, scholar, educator, cultural worker and creature of the Colombian diaspora. They are the author of The Inheritance of Haunting (University of Notre Dame Press, 2019), Ephemeral (Ecotheo Collective, 2024), and the forthcoming poetry collection, Wayward Creatures (Host Publications, 2025). They are a professor of feminist, queer, and disability studies and their poetry and creative non-fiction have been published in American Poetry Review, The Normal School, Michigan Quarterly Review, Alocasia, Poetry, and Waxwing, among other places.

Info: Jae Nichelle is an storyteller, poetry slam champion, and big fan of playing Just Dance even though she's not that good at it. She is the author of God Themselves (Andrews McMeel, 2023) and The Porch (As Sanctuary) (YesYes Books, 2019).

Info: m. mick powell is a queer Black Cabo Verdean femme, a poet, a professor, an artist, an Aries, and the author of threesome in the last Toyota Celica and other circus tricks. Their collection DEAD GIRL CAMEO is forthcoming from One World in August 2025.

Info: Cloud Delfina Cardona (she/they) is an artist, writer, and book cover designer from San Antonio, Texas. She is the author of What Remains, winner of the 2020 Host Publications Chapbook Prize, and the past is a jean jacket, winner of the Hub City Press BIPOC Poetry Series. She is the co-founder of Infrarrealista Review, a literary nonprofit that publishes Texan voices.

Info: Amanda Johnston is a writer, visual artist, and the Texas Poet Laureate.

Info: Perfect time for a mocktail, buy from the featured writers booksale, mingle in the theater or the patio, make a new writing bestie!

Info: Em Palughi is a queer poet from South Alabama. You can find her work in Gulf Coast, Black Warrior Review, Foglifter, The Southern Poetry Anthology: Alabama, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in Poetry from Vanderbilt University where she was awarded the 2024 Kathryn Sedberry Prize.

Info: Lily Someson is a poet and educator from Gary, Indiana. She is the author of Mistaken for Loud Comets, winner of the Host Publications Spring 2021 chapbook prize, and has been published in the Academy of American Poets, Poetry Daily, Underblong, and Court Green among others. She graduated with her MFA in Poetry from Vanderbilt University and is now a co-owner of Baldwin's Books & Records, a radical bookstore pop-up in Madison, WI.

Info: Ari is a Chinese American poet raised in Austin Texas, and a first year MA student at Texas Tech University . His poetic passions are; the Asian American experience in Texas, Queerness in the Southern United States, and overall having a little fun.

Info: mónica teresa ortiz was born, raised, and based in Texas. Their most recent poetry collection, Book of Provocations, was published by Host Publications in 2024. They believe in a liberated Palestine and freedom for all oppressed people.

Info: Anel I. Flores, trans-queer Xicane writer and artist, captures experiences across diverse realms in their multi-disciplinary work. They believe in re-membering stories, spirituality, radical love, and kinship. Works include La Fea, play and book Empanada: A Lesbiana Story en Probaditas, zine Les Maestres, novel Curtains of Rain and anthologies JOTA and I Love Us (2025). In process is Flores's Bilingual Edition of Empanada and hybrid graphic memoir Painted Red. Publications extend to Fifth Wednesday, Switchgrass, Camino Real, Somos Xicana, Entre Guadalupe y Malinche and more. She is a Macondo Writer, founder of Queer Voices and La Otra Taller Nepantla. Awards include: Andrew W. Mellon DRJ Artists in Residence, Writer in Residence at OLLU, the Catalyst for Change Award, Nebrija Creadores Award, et al.

Info: Stephanie Niu is a poet and writer from Marietta, Georgia. She is the author of I Would Define the Sun, which won the inaugural Vanderbilt University Literary Prize, and chapbooks Survived By (Host Publications, 2024) and She Has Dreamt Again of Water (Diode Editions, 2022). She lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

The Count's Den, 1039 South Olive Street, Los Angeles, United States