I Shall – E.J. Batiste
E.J. Batiste’s project for the 2024 Jack Straw Writers Program is a collection of poems two years in the making, covering a range of topics including her experience as a person of color in the rural south, femininity, prayer, and history. In her conversation with curator Nisi Shawl, they explore her recent name change and what it means for her work, why she sometimes prefers printed poems, and how her queerness shows up in her writing. “I shall walk in the ethereal energy that I denied myself / That same energy they scoffed at / And told me to tone down.”
Music by EarthtoneSkytone, produced in part through the Jack Straw Artist Support Program.
