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The Watering Hole Poetry, Columbia, SC (2026)

08/27/2026

TWHTribe Group A Fellows from last year winter retreat!!

— circa December 2025,
Hickory K**b State Park, S.C.

Countdown to the 2026 winter retreat is upon us. See you soon TRIBE!

📸 : Blless

Portrait of 2025 TWH Group A Fellows posing at The Watering Hole Winter Retreat after the graduation ceremony.

Group A!!!!

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

08/26/2026

Congrats to Cai Sherley ( Cai Sherley ) on their forthcoming chapbook, Out of Yearning published by Sibling Rivalry Press (Sibling Rivalry Press ) !!! 🖤💐🖤

Pre-Order Available Now.

In OUT OF YEARNING, Black trans poet Cai Sherley transforms yearning into revelation. These luminous poems navigate gender transition, Black ancestry, family, music, grief, and ecstatic self-discovery through forms as inventive as their vision. By turns intimate and celebratory, Sherley’s work refuses shame in favor of embodiment, tenderness, and the powerful act of claiming the body as one’s own. A stunning debut, Out of Yearning marks the arrival of a vital new voice in contemporary American poetry, one we believe will help carry the art form into its future.

📸: Cover art of Out of Yearning | second slide author headshot of Cai Sherley and their bio .

CAI SHERLEY (he/him) is a Black trans poet-educator with
roots in Boston, Massachusetts. A two-time Pushcart Prize
nominee, his work can be found in Beestung, Best New Poets,
swamp pink, Peach Mag, and Tupelo, among others, as well
as the anthology I Feel Nothing Like Good: Poets Against
Genocide. He has found homes at The Watering Hole, Brooklyn
Poets, Tin House, Lambda, and the Chicago Poetry Center,
and is a member of both the Crossroads Writers Collective
and Trans Corner Poets. His work centers Black trans life,
past and present, in the United States. He received an MFA in
Creative Writing from NYU and lives in Western Massachusetts.

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

08/26/2026

Congrats to Roman Bolaji Johnson ( Roman Johnson ) as a 2026 Kimbilio Fiction (Kimbilio Fellow) !!! 💐💐💐

Roman Johnson, PhD is a writer from Memphis, Tennessee. He is currently a second-year Master of Fine Arts student in the Department of Literary Arts at Brown University. He has a Ph.D. in Medical Sociology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, a M.A. in African American Studies from Georgia State University and obtained a B.A. in Political Science from Morehouse College. He is the co-founder of the New England Hoodoo Society. He is the winner of the 2026 Michael S. Harper Memorial Prize in Poetry from Brown University, Lucille Clifton Poetry Prize from Backbone Press, a past winner of the Clark Atlanta University Poetry Prize and has received fellowships and residencies in poetry, fiction, and science from The Watering Hole, Harvard University, Northwestern University, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Brown University, the National Institutes of Health, Breadloat, Lambda Literary, and elsewhere. His work can be found in Arc Poetry Magazine, American Literary Review, Obsidian, African Voices Magazine, and elsewhere. He can be found online at his personal website: literaryhoodoo.com. He believes the real work of writing is living well.

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

1st slide: Portrait of Roman Johnson with banner of Kimbilio for Black Fiction logo, The Watering Hole logo, and text Roman Johnson 2026 Kimbilio Fellow.

2nd slide: Second slide graphic of Roman Johnson in a green sweater and wooden panel in the background .

📸 Photo Credit: TWH TRIBE, Blless

08/26/2026

Today’s craft talk we look at the .

TWHTribe (Aerik Francis) Aerik Francis ’s Gigan for Opening the Urn in earlier issue from Indiana Review .

Observe how the use of anaphora builds the rhythm and tone in the poem.

What other ways does the use of anaphora amplify the poem?

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.]

08/25/2026

Today’s we discuss the . Stay tuned as we roll out upcoming virtual events.

(Jaz Sufi) Jasmine Wilkerson Sufi Litany to Protect Against Possession after Kaveh Akbar published in Southeast Review !

Note how the litany roots itself in a prayer.

How does the use of litany impacts the tone and language throughout the poem?

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/ reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

📝: Southeast Review

08/21/2026

Happy National Poet Day Tribe!!!

Today’s we visit the .

TWHTribe (Cai Sherley) Cai Sherley Afro Pick Elegy in a previous issue from beestung .

Notice how the elegy elevates the speaker relationship within their blackness and the Afro pick.

What other ways does the elegy form heightens the relationship to the Afro pick?

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.]

08/20/2026

Congrats to Rodrick Minor (Rodrick Minor ) as a fall 2026 Ucross | Artist Residency (Ucross Fellow) !!! 💐💐💐

Rodrick Minor is a visual artist, poet, and Black foodways advocate from Mississippi and Louisiana. He’s a four-time member of the Baton Rouge National Poetry Slam Team, the 2015 Baton Rouge Grand Slam Champion, and a member of the 2016 Philadelphia National Poetry Slam Team.

Their poetry explores the study of Afro-gastronomy, how food is central to identity, traditions, intimacy, spirituality and culture overall. His work has appeared in Voicemail Poems, Gravy Quarterly, The American Poetry Review, Knights Library Magazine, Micro Podcast, Duende, Poemhood: Our Black Revival: History, Folklore and The Black Experience: A Young Adult Poetry Anthology (Harper Collins, 2024), Callaloo, Nashville Review, Bellingham Review, and other forthcoming presses and journals. He is a Best of Net nominee, 2026 Best New Poet, Cave Canem Fellow, McCormack Writing Center Fellow formerly known as Tin House, Watering Hole Fellow, Winter Tangerine Alumnus, Hurston-Wright Fellow, BOAAT Press Fellow, 2025 Charleston Literary Festival Cato Fellowship Prize Shortlist, 2025 New Southern Voices Poetry Prize Finalist, 2026 Deep Line Poetry Series Finalist, 2026 Stan and Tom Wick Finalist, and 2026 CAAP P Book Prize Finalist.

He earned an M.F.A. in poetry at Randolph College, where he was awarded the Nancy Craig Blackburn ’71 Fellowship. He is currently an editor for Voicemail Poem

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

1st slide: Portrait of Rodrick Minor with banner displaying Ucross logo, The Watering Hole logo, and text Rodrick Minor fall 2026 Ucross Fellow.

2nd slide: Second slide graphic of Rodrick Minor in a black tee with glasses and white background .

📸 Photo Credit: Himself

08/20/2026

Congrats to Alafia Nicole Sessions ( Alafia Nicole Sessions ) as a fall 2026 Ucross fellow (Ucross) !!! 💐💐💐

Alafia Nicole Sessions is a black poet, writer and mother living in Atlanta. She currently works as an educator, actress, herbalist and birthworker. Nine Drops of Turpentine, Alafia’s debut poetry collection, was selected by Victoria Chang as the winner of the Georgia Poetry Prize and will be published by University of Georgia Press in March 2027.

Her poetry has been published or is forthcoming in POETRY, Obsidian, Ploughshares, Poem-a-Day, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cincinnati Review, Ecopoetry Anthology, Southern Humanities Review, Indiana Review, Los Angeles Review, Poetry Daily and elsewhere. Alafia is the recipient of awards and fellowships from Cave Canem, Yaddo, The Watering Hole, Sustainable Arts Foundation, Money For Women / The Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, SWWIM and Oak Spring Garden Foundation. The 2025 winner of Georgia Writers’ John Lewis Writing Grant, Alafia was selected by Evie Shockley as the winner of the 2023 Furious Flower Prize. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize, thrice nominated for Best New Poets and selected as a semi-finalist for The Adroit Journal’s Gregory Djanikian Scholarship. Alafia also received the Howard Moss Residency in Poetry.

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

1st slide: Portrait of Alafia Nicole Sessions with banner displaying Ucross logo, The Watering Hole logo, and text Alafia Nicole Sessions Fall 2026 Ucross Fellow.

2nd slide: Second slide graphic of Alafia Nicole Sessions in a white dress and foliage in the background .

08/13/2026

Congrats to Ching-In Chen ( Ching-In Chen) as a 2026-2027 Baldwin For The Arts (Baldwin For The Arts Fellow) !!! 💐💐💐

Poet and organizer Ching-In Chen is author of to make black paper sing (speCt! books, 2019), recombinant (2017), and The Heart’s Traffic (2009). They have coedited two anthologies: The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities (2011) and Here Is a Pen: An Anthology of West Coast Kundiman Poets (2009). A Kundiman, Lambda, and Callaloo fellow, they are a part of the Macondo and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation writing communities, and have been a participant in Sharon Bridgforth’s Theatrical Jazz Institute. They have helped to organize Asian American communities in San Francisco, Oakland, Riverside, and Boston. Chen earned a BA from Tufts University, MFA from University of California, Riverside, and PhD from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.

Chen has been awarded fellowships from The Watering Hole, Soul Mountain Retreat, Ragdale Foundation, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Millay Colony, and the Norman Mailer Center. Their poem-play “The Geisha Play” was nominated for a John Cauble Short Play Award. They currently teach at University of Washington, Bothell.

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

1st slide:

Black and white portrait of Ching-In Chen with banner of Baldwin For The Arts logo, The Watering Hole logo, and text Ching-In Chen 2026-2027 Baldwin For The Arts Fellow.

2nd slide:

Second slide graphic of Ching-In Chen in a polo button up with bricks in the background .

📸 Photo Credit: Cassie Mira

08/12/2026

Congrats to Rodrick Minor (Rodrick Minor ) as a 2026-2027 Baldwin For The Arts (Baldwin For The Arts Fellow) !!! 💐💐💐

Rodrick Minor is a visual artist, poet, and Black foodways advocate from Mississippi and Louisiana. He’s a four-time member of the Baton Rouge National Poetry Slam Team, the 2015 Baton Rouge Grand Slam Champion, and a member of the 2016 Philadelphia National Poetry Slam Team.

Their poetry explores the study of Afro-gastronomy, how food is central to identity, traditions, intimacy, spirituality and culture overall. His work has appeared in Voicemail Poems, Gravy Quarterly, The American Poetry Review, Knights Library Magazine, Micro Podcast, Duende, Poemhood: Our Black Revival: History, Folklore and The Black Experience: A Young Adult Poetry Anthology (Harper Collins, 2024), Callaloo, Nashville Review, Bellingham Review, and other forthcoming presses and journals. He is a Best of Net nominee, 2026 Best New Poet, Cave Canem Fellow, McCormack Writing Center Fellow formerly known as Tin House, Watering Hole Fellow, Winter Tangerine Alumnus, Hurston-Wright Fellow, BOAAT Press Fellow, 2025 Charleston Literary Festival Cato Fellowship Prize Shortlist, 2025 New Southern Voices Poetry Prize Finalist, and 2026 Deep Line Poetry Series Finalist.

He earned an M.F.A. in poetry at Randolph College, where he was awarded the Nancy Craig Blackburn ’71 Fellowship. He is currently an editor for Voicemail Poem

[ Are you Tribe and have a shoutout? E-mail us at [email protected]. We can’t promote everything, but we’ll do what we can.

If you are Tribe with an upcoming or recently published book, we’d like to collaborate with one of your regional bookstore/reading venues. We can only do a few a year, so please reach out soon to start this conversation. ]

1st slide: Portrait of Rodrick Minor with banner of Baldwin For The Arts logo, The Watering Hole logo, and text Rodrick Minor 2026-2027 Baldwin For The Arts Fellow.

2nd slide: Second slide graphic of Rodrick Minor in a black tee with glasses and white background .

📸 Photo Credit: Himself

The Watering Hole Poetry

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