Join the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Literature Department in celebrating the 30th Anniversary season of Monday Poets. This year’s theme is Sankofa (SAHN-koh-fah), a Twi word from the Akan Tribe of Ghana which loosely implies that to move forward, one must “go back and get it”. In that spirit we will be celebrating at each event a past Monday Poet and introduce a new one. Each month from September 2024 to April 2025 a new Sankofa pair will read at a new library. Monday Poets exists to inspire and connect poets and community members across the city of Philadelphia. This program, hosted by Widener Library, is free and open to the public.

Previous Monday Poet: Marissa Johnson-Valenzuela

A multi-disciplinary artist and writer, Marissa Johnson-Valenzuela's work has been published and supported by many great people and projects including: American Poetry Review, Gulf Coast, Prism International, Foundry, and the Bodies Built for Game anthology (University of Nebraska 2019) and Organize Your Own: The Politics and Poetics of Self-Determination Movements (Soberscove 2016).  Marissa’s No Otro Lado, a full-length conceptual reggaeton poetry album about U.S.-Mexico is available on vinyl and on most streaming services. Marissa is the founder of Thread Makes Blanket press and the recipient of a 2020 Pew Fellowship from The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage.

New Monday Poet: Andrea Walls

Philadelphia Cultural Treasure, Andrea "Philly" Walls, is a poet, photographer, digital artist and grassroots collaborator. She is the founder of Museum of Black Joy and The D'Archive. Her work is informed by the artists of The Harlem Renaissance and Black Arts Movement and she is pleased that her writing, scholarship, and visual art have been supported by organizations she admires, including the Leeway Foundation, VONA/Voices Workshops for Writers of Color; Black Public Media, MIT Open Documentary Lab, Hedgebrook Residencies for Women Authoring Change; The Colored Girls Museum; Writers Room at Drexel University; The Studio Museum of Harlem; The Women’s Mobile Museum, Eastern State Penitentiary, Mural Arts Philadelphia; Forman Arts Initiative and FabYouth Philly.