The Poet Speaks Podcast

In this Season 10 finale of The Poet Speaks Podcast, host Amanda Eke sits with Muttertongue — Lillian Allen, Gary Barwin, and Gregory Betts — to explore poetry as sound, collaboration, and living archive. Their latest project, What Is a Word in Utter Space, is a sonic poetry LP that bends language beyond the page, inviting listeners into a layered soundscape where voice, rhythm, and experimentatio...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Uche Nduka! Uche Nduka is a Nigerian American poet-pilgrim, collagist, and essayist presently living in New York City. He is the author of 15 volumes of poems of which the latest are BAINBRIDGE ISLAND NOTEBOOK(Roof Books, 2023) and TO UMBER(The Bodily Press,2025). A NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Poetry, his writing has been translated into Italian, Finnish, Turki...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Tiriq Rashad! A proud native of Atlantic City and Pleasantville, or “Atlantic-Ville” as he affectionately calls it, Tiriq Rashad draws deeply from his roots to craft a narrative style steeped in resilience, authenticity, and empathy. With a master’s degree in social work and a calling to heal through words, he has built a body of work that speaks to the soul wh...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Fatima-Ayan Malika Hirsi! Fatima's work strives to instigate action in service to world-building, social change, and collaboration. Her poems live in Obsidian: Literature & Arts in the African Diaspora, MAYDAY, Torch, Rise Up Review, and other portals. She is a fellow of the Pink Door Writing Retreat, the Anaphora Arts Writing Residency, In Surreal Life, an...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Erica Miriam Fabri! Erica Miriam Fabri is a Brooklyn-based poet. Her first book, Dialect of a Skirt, published by Hanging Loose Press (2010), was a finalist for the 2011 Paterson Poetry Prize and included on the list for: The Best Books of 2010 at About.com; and the bestseller lists for Small Press Distribution and the Poetry Foundation. Her second book, Morpho...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Keys Will! Keys Will is a poet, author, and educator whose pen-seasoned lines rise from lived experience and the work of becoming. Under her moniker Keys Will, she crafts poetry and prose with quiet power: inviting readers and listeners into spaces of healing, introspection, and reclamation. Her chapbook Chrysalis (and upcoming works) mark her as a vital contem...

Season 10 of The Poet Speaks opens with a historic conversation with Richard Blanco, Presidential Inaugural Poet, award-winning author, educator, and cultural voice!  Born in Spain to Cuban exile parents and raised in Miami, Richard has long explored the universal themes of home, identity, and belonging through his poetry, memoirs, and public work. In this episode, he and Amanda reflect on his jou...

It's the SEASON 9 Finale! Check out Amanda's conversation with Mason Granger ! Mason Granger (he/him) is a spoken word artist with over a decade of experience on stages & in educational settings across all 50 states and nine countries. His work centers around matters of class, nature, and sustainability-- both of ourselves as human beings and the world we share-- all from an imaginative and fo...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Adela Najarro! Adela Najarro is the author of four poetry collections, including Volcanic Interruptions, which earned an Honorable Mention at the 2024 International Latino Book Awards. Her forthcoming collection, Variations in Blue, will be published in March 2025 by Letras Latinas/Red Hen Press. A California Arts Council Fellow, Najarro is a passionate advocat...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Yetvart S. Majian! Yetvart S. Majian, a first-generation Armenian-American native of Hudson County and Saint Peter’s University alum, is a local poetry facilitator, active performer and literary organizer in the tristate area. Yetvart's Links: @emajian CHECK OUT AMANDA'S NEW TV SHOW: The Poet Speaks with Amanda Eke! Now airing on the Archaeology Channel and Rok...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Larry Love!  Larry Love is a dynamic professional spoken word artist who performs powerful pieces of poetry with an urgent intent to highlight the need for social change. He is also the Writer, Producer and Director of several spoken Word musical stage plays which center on love and the unpredictability of relationships. As founder and CEO of the entertainment...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Shay.thepoet ! Shataysha Byrd was born and raised in the Bronx, New York. Shataysha originally started poetry in fifth grade but did not get the courage to perform in front of an audience until 20 years old. After the first performance, she knew the stage was her home from that moment on. Then the pandemic took a different turn in the world that stopped many di...

Welcome to Season 9! Check out Amanda's conversation with Brandon Leake! Brandon Leake is the season 15 winner of America’s Got Talent, a 7x Telly Award Winner, 1x SOVAS Award Winner, and 1x Emmy Award Winner. Brandon has been a Poetic Performer, Keynote Speaker, and Workshop leader for over a decade, traveling locations such as: New Zealand, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, and 42 States. Brandon ha...

It's our Season 8 Finale! Check out Amanda's conversation with Regie Cabico! Regie Cabico is a spoken word pioneer having won The Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. Mr. Cabico was a featured poet at the 2022 Whitney Biennial and received the 2006 Writers for Writers Award from Poets & Writers. Television credits include HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, TEDx & NPR’s Snap Judgement.  He is a teaching art...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Thomas Fucaloro! The winner of numerous grants from the Staten Island Council of the Arts, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, NYC Office for the Prevention of Hate Crimes and NYC Commission of Human Rights to name a few. Thomas Fucaloro has been on six national slam teams. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the New School and is a co-founding editor...

Check out Amanda's conversation with LaTasha Diggs! A writer, vocalist and performance/sound artist, LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs is the author of Village (Coffee House Press 2023), TwERK (Belladonna, 2013) as well as the co-editor of  Coon Bidness .  Diggs has presented and performed at California Institute of the Arts, El Museo del Barrio, The Museum of Modern Art, and Walker Art Center and at festiv...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Ralonda Simmons! Ralonda Simmons is a speaker, published author, educator, and singer born in California but residing in the Denver metro area. She received her BA from Metropolitan State University of Denver, and her MS from Boise State University. She’s also a proud graduate of two seasons of the Community Literature Initiative out of Los Angeles. As an artis...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Miguel Martin Perez! Miguel Martin Perez (he/they) is a queer Afro-Dominican poet raised in Harlem and the South Bronx. He is a Cave Canem Fellow, a 2022 Langston Hughes Fellow at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival, and an alum of the Tin House Winter Workshop. His work has received the Leslie McGrath Poetry Prize in 2023, the Pacific Spirit Poetry Prize in 2021, a...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Siggy Trust! Sagirah “Siggy” Layne is an Accountant and poet/spoken word artist of Grenadian descent, from Brooklyn, NY. She started her accounting career as an auditor at Ernst & Young over 10 years ago in NY before moving to CA and switching to tax. She began performing spoken word over 6 years ago after moving to CA, although she’s been writing since she...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Nerd The Poet! Dominic “Nerd” McDonald also known as Nerd the Poet, is a young Black Entrepreneur and Spoken Word artist from various cities in Los Angeles, California who relocated to the DC Metro area in 2019. He has put his views on growing up in the inner city between two households, his Hip Hop music obsession, college experiences, and more into Poetry and...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Anastasia Lindsey!  Anastasia Lindsey is an award-winning author and self-taught poet, native to IL. Her work explores the ways in which relationships shape us in specific and universal ways, the waves of human emotions, the healing journey, and the transformational power of love. She is also a photographer, creative, singer, and artist. Her book, O C E A N, ha...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Marlana-Patrice Pugh Hamer! Marlana-Patrice Pugh Hamer (She/Her) is an award-winning poet, writer, performer, public speaker, educator, and volunteer/activist. She has a BA in English. Also, an MEd in Curriculum & Instruction.  Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared in various anthologies. Most recently, Dimepiece: Ten Years of CLI Poetry. Her debut poetry...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Tess Taylor! Tess Taylor’s  body of work deals with place, ecology, memory and cultural reckoning.  She’s published five celebrated poetry collections: The Misremembered World, The Forage House, Last West: Roadsongs for Dorothea Lange, and Rift Zone, one of the Boston Globe’s best books of 2020. Her book Work & Days was one of the NY Times best poetry books...

It's the Season 7 Finale! Check out Amanda's conversation with Moyosolaoluwa Olowokure! Moyosolaoluwa Olowokure is a Nigerian poet, model, digital creator, and recording artiste whose work explores psychology, spirituality, and romance. Her works have graced African Creatives’ platforms such as, the Aké Festival, LIPFEST, KABAFEST, BellaNaija, and Drummr Africa. She is also known for her commissio...

Check out Amanda's conversation with Benin Lemus! Benin Lemus (she|her) is an LA-based poet and educator. Born in La Mesa, California, and raised in Portland, Oregon, she has called many places home, including North Carolina where she attended Bennett College for Women, an HBCU where she earned a degree in English Literature. Her debut poetry collection, Dreaming in Mourning, is published by World...