Germantown native Kai Davis is Philly’s new poet laureate, selected out of 16 applicants, a record number for the position.
“Poetry is a community practice,” Davis says. “I believe that the poet laureate’s duty is to gather people on the margins and bring them to the center so that we can find and love one another.”
That’s a lesson Davis said she learned growing up in Germantown surrounded by artists and writers. Since then, she’s self-published four collections and had other poems published in “The Offing” and “The Shade Journal.” She’s also performed for TEDx Philly, CNN, BET, PBS and NPR. She’s won two international competitions: Brave New Voices in 2011 and The College Union Poetry Slam Invitational in 2016.
According to her bio on the library’s website, Davis is a “a Black queer writer, performer, and teaching artist” whose work “explores Blackness, Queerness, womanhood, and the ways these identities converge.”
In addition to serving as poetry editor for “Apiary Magazine,” Davis serves as co-host and artistic director for Philadelphia-based poetry performance collective The Philly Pigeon.
Herself a former educator, Mayor Cherelle Parker praised Davis, saying that “As an English teacher and lifelong student of literature, I love poetry. It gives voice to some of our deepest yearnings. I wish Kai Davis much success, and the opportunity to touch and inspire many residents across our great city.”
Yolanda Wisher is a former Philadelphia Poet Laureate and co-chairs the Poet Laureate Governing Committee. She said Davis’ selection “is emblematic of the ways the Philly poetry community continues to nurture laureates. Born and raised in Philadelphia, rooted in the performance of poetry, and one of our youngest adult laureates, Kai enriches the lineage and scope of the poet laureate program.”
Since 2017, the city’s poet laureate program has been administered by the Free Library and recognizes an “exceptional poet who also demonstrates a commitment to the power of poetry to engage and inspire people throughout Philadelphia’s neighborhoods.”
The position was first created in 2012 under the city’s Office of Arts, Culture, and the Creative Economy.
Meet Davis in person and hear her perform some of her work at The Philly Pigeon’s next event at PhilaMOCA on N. 12th St on Friday, Feb. 2 at 8:30 p.m.
