Citywide Search for Houston's Next Poet Laureate Set to Take Place in Program’s 12th Year

Citywide Search for Houston's Next Poet Laureate Set to Take Place in Program's 12th Year

November 14, 2024 -- The City of Houston is searching for its next poet laureate. In its 12th year, the Poet Laureate program has selected six poet laureates to represent Houston.

The program celebrates Houston's rich culture and diversity through the work of a Houston poet who serves as the city's ambassador for the literary arts. During a two-year appointment, the poet laureate makes several guest appearances at special events and completes a community outreach project. The poet laureate will receive an honorarium of $20,000 through the City Initiative grant program funded by a portion of the city's Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT) and serve from April 2025 through April 2027.

The role of the Houston poet laureate is to stimulate poetic impulse, foster appreciation of poetry in all its forms, and serve Houston residents and visitors with expressions of culture through words. Each Poet Laureate for the City creates a signature Community Outreach project. The current Poet Laureate, Aris Kian Brown, is creating "Space for Us: Afrofuturism and the Poetic Imagination," a multidisciplinary exhibition utilizing the Black historical archives, multilingual poetry, and community interviews to imagine and demand the future of a liberated Houston. Previous Poet Laureate projects include -

• Space City Mixtape, a mixture of spoken word narratives of Houston residents set to music by Russel Gus (Emanuelee "Outspoken" Bean, 2021-2023)
• Bayou City Broadsides, artistic displays of lines from poems of everyday Houstonians (Leslie Contreras Schwartz, 2019-2021)
• Emerge, 11 community performance poetry videos highlighting various Houston neighborhoods (Deborah "D.E.E.P." Mouton, 2017-2019)
• Houston's Favorite Poems, a published anthology of residents' favorite poetry (Dr. Robin Davidson, 2015-2017)
• Creation of the Houston Poet Laureate's social media platforms (Gwen Zepeda, 2015-2017)

The application deadline is midnight on Wednesday, December 11, 2024, 11:59 PM CST. Submissions from poets, authors, writers, and spoken word artists are welcome.

• The guidelines, term requirements, and application portal for the Houston Poet Laureate are available here.

The Houston Poet Laureate Selection Committee, a panel of poets, scholars, and literary experts diverse in age, ethnicity, and experience, will review eligible applications. Non-voting members of the Committee include Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs Director Necole Irvin and Justin Bogert of Houston Public Library. The Committee will interview finalists in early February, and the selection of Houston's next poet laureate will be announced in April in celebration of National Poetry Month.

The program is coordinated by the MOCA and HPL and funded through the Hotel Occupancy Tax, which is dedicated to the arts.

About the Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs
The City of Houston Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs guides the City's cultural investments with policies and initiatives that expand access to arts and cultural programs in the community, attract visitors, and leverage private investment. Learn more at www.houstontx.gov/culturalaffairs, and follow us on Facebook and Instagram.

About Houston Public Library
We are a dynamic organization that serves one of the largest service areas - both population and area - in the country. 2.3 million residents in the City of Houston are the primary beneficiaries of a comprehensive customer-focused service delivery strategy. Our system consists of 44 public service units which include one Central Library, five Regional Libraries, 29 Neighborhood and Express Libraries, three History Research Centers, three TECHLink technology centers, a satellite location at Children's Museum Houston, cafécollege Houston, and Mobile Express.

For further information about the Houston Public Library visit www.houstonlibrary.org, Facebook at facebook.com/houstonlibrary/, or call 832.393.1313.