Poetry on Stage: Aziza Barnes & BLKS

F**ked up sh*t happens. After an unsavory wake-up call, Octavia decides to put off her troubles and have one last turn up with her friends. In poet Aziza Barnes’s ingenious portrait of a day in the life of four young black women discovering life’s uncomfortable truths in New York City, BLKS explores the joy and anguish of growing up and out. Riotously funny and distinctly rendered, Barnes’s playwriting debut marks the arrival of a truly original contemporary American voice.

Join poet/playwright Aziza Barnes, director Nataki Garrett, and the cast of BLKS for select scenes and conversation moderated by poet and playwright Kristiana Rae Colón.

Winner of the 2015 Pamet River Prize, Aziza Barnes’s first full length collection, i be but i ain’t is from YesYes Books, 2016. She is a Cave Canem Fellow, co-founder of The Conversation Literary Festival and co-host of the podcast, The Poetry Gods.

Co-presented with Steppenwolf Theatre Company. 

BLKS runs at Steppenwolf Theatre from December 7 – January 28.