Event Title: A Reading and Conversation with Cathy Park Hong, Tyehimba Jess, and Morgan Parker, Sponsored by Cave Canem
Description: Three award-winning poets give brief readings of their original work, followed by a moderated conversation on a range of topics from race and poetic form to the poet's evolving role and responsibility in and to a literary landscape at once predominantly white and rapidly diversifying.
Participants: Cathy Park Hong, Tyehimba Jess, Morgan Parker
Location: Ballroom B, Tampa Convention Center, First Floor
Date & Time: Friday, March 9, 3:00 p.m. – 4:15 p.m.
 

Q: What book or books that you’ve read over the last year would you most highly recommend?
A: I loved Stephen Florida by Gabe Habash, Madness by sam sax, You're the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened by Arisa White, Ordinary Beast by Nicole Sealey, Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli, blud by Rachel McKibbens, and Together and By Ourselves by Alex Dimitrov.

Q: What are a writer’s main responsibilities in this particular cultural moment?
A: As ever, to tell the truth.

Q: Has public funding for the arts made a difference in your life and career as a writer?
A: Absolutely and without a doubt. Acknowledging an artist's labor as a valuable and critical contribution to culture is the cornerstone of society, and investing in artists is investing in progress. 

Q: If you’ve been to Tampa before, what places do you recommend that our attendees should visit?
A: Lector Wine Bar is a great community space with outstanding wine selections!

Morgan Parker is the author of There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé and Other People’s Comfort Keeps Me Up At Night, which was selected by Eileen Myles for the 2013 Gatewood Prize and was a finalist for the Poetry Society of America's Norma Farber First Book Award. Parker is the recipient of a 2017 NEA fellowship, a 2016 Pushcart Prize, and is a Cave Canem graduate fellow. She is an editor for Day One and Little A, and the creator and host of Reparations, Live! at the Ace Hotel in New York. With Tommy Pico, she co-curates the Poets With Attitude (PWA) reading series, and with Angel Nafis, she is The Other Black Girl Collective, a Brooklyn-based black feminist poetry duo.