February 24, 2020

I am deliberate and afraid of nothing: a reading of Mizna authors in New York City

by Nailah Taman | in Literary

In an effort to confront this difficult time with the power of creative communities, our originally scheduled reading for Thursday, March 26, co-sponsored with AAWW and featuring Andrea Abi Karam, Sham-e-Ali Nayeem, and Romaissaa Benzizoune will now be live-streamed as a virtual event on AAWW’s Facebook page. Details and instructions on how to join us remotely will be circulated next week. 

A NOTE ON ACCESSIBILITY: a live-edited accessible copy of the program can be found at aaww.org/poetryprotestvirtual.

Mizna joins the Asian American Writers’ Workshop to present I Am Deliberate And Afraid of Nothing: Poetry, Prose, and Protest, a reading of Mizna authors on Thursday, March 26. This evening is a joyous first collaboration between Mizna and the Asian American Writers’ Workshop (AAWW). $5 suggested donation, this reading will be live streamed on the AAWW Facebook page. This event is part of National Poetry Coalition programming and is supported by the Academy of American Poets with funds from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and is also supported by a National Endowment for the Arts grant to Mizna.

About the Asian American Writers’ Workshop

AAWW is devoted to creating, publishing, developing and disseminating creative writing by Asian Americans, and to providing an alternative literary arts space at the intersection of migration, race, and social justice. Since our founding in 1991, we have been dedicated to the belief that Asian American stories deserve to be told. At a time when migrants, women, people of color, Muslims, and LGBTQ people are specifically targeted, we offer a new countercultural public space in which to imagine a more just future.

About the Readers

Andrea Abi-Karam is an Arab-American genderqueer punk poet-performer cyborg, writing on the art of killing bros, the intricacies of cyborg bodies, trauma & delayed healing. Their chapbook, THE AFTERMATH (Commune Editions), attempts to queer Fanon’s vision of how poetry fails to inspire revolution. Andrea’s first book, EXTRATRANSMISSION [Kelsey Street Press, 2019], is a poetic critique of the U.S. military’s role in the War on Terror.

Romaissaa Benzizoune is from New York City and from-from Morocco. Her personal essays have appeared in outlets including Buzzfeed, McSweeney’s, Teen Vogue, and The New York Times. Her current obsession is TikTok the app.

Sham-e-Ali Nayeem is the author of the poetry collection, City of Pearls (UpSet Press 2019). She is a Muslim Indian American poet and artist of Hyderabadi descent. A former public interest lawyer supporting economic justice for survivors of family and intimate partner violence, Sham-e-Ali is the recipient of the Loft Literary Center Spoken Word Immersion Fellowship.