Listening to Our Elders: Stories and Objects

"Mami often says that when you hear the same story twice, you are supposed to get something different from it." In this workshop, Philadelphia poet laureate, Raina J. León invites you to bring the stories and objects from your elders (and your elders, if you want to!) to learn ways of writing from the stories that you've heard over and over again. We will learn strategies of eliciting details from our elders from oral historian and archivist, L. Renée, see the strategies models as Raina shares family photographs and interviews from her parents (guest speakers, for this event!), and then delve deep into writing poems from those stories and objects. A partnership between the Academy of American Poets and Blue Stoop, a fiscally sponsored organization of CultureTrust Greater Philadelphia, dedicated to nurturing an inclusive literary community by creating pathways to access writing education, inspiration, and professional support, and celebrating Philadelphia’s rich writing tradition. Learn more Raina J. Leon, PhD is Black, Afro-Boricua, and from Philadelphia (Lenni Lenape ancestral lands). She is the 2026-2027 Poet Laureate of Philadelphia. She is a mother, daughter, sister, madrina, comadre, partner, poet, writer, and teacher educator. She believes in collective action and community work, the profound power of holding space for the telling of our stories, and the liberatory practice of humanizing education. She seeks out communities of care and craft and is a member of the Carolina African American Writers Collective, Cave Canem, CantoMundo, Macondo. She is the author of black god mother this body, Canticle of Idols, Boogeyman Dawn, sombra : (dis)locate, and the chapbooks,profeta without refuge and Areyto to Atabey: Essays on the Mother(ing) Self. She publishes across forms in visual art, poetry, nonfiction, fiction, and scholarly work. She has received fellowships and residencies and attended retreats with The Watering Hole, the Obsidian Foundation, VONA,…