Congratulations to San Francisco's New Poet Laureate, Tongo Eisen-Martin

Today we're catching up with last week's news that Tongo Eisen-Martin has been named San Francisco's eighth poet laureate. Mayor London Breed offered these hopeful words while making the announcement: "I've had the pleasure of working with Tongo when he was teaching artist at the African American Arts and Culture complex, and I've seen his remarkable ability to spur creativity in youth and inspire them to find their own voice." Breed continued, "His work on racial justice and equity, along with his commitment to promoting social and cultural change, comes at such a critical time for our city and our country."

In his introductory comments, Eisen-Martin acknowledged San Francisco's long and thriving poetic history, while striving for even greater outreach and inclusivity: "As deep into the various communities of the city as our poets have already brought the craft, I want to push even further into places where poetry has not yet permeated. Give poetry even more of a mass personality; as mass participation has always been the staple of what could be described as San Francisco futurism."

We recently added an October 2019 reading by Eisen-Martin (along with Eric Dolan and Fego Navarro) from the Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive's reading series, organized by Cole Solinger. Listen in to that set, along with readings by Trisha Low, Elaine Kahn, Tatiana Luboviski-Acosta, Ocean Escalanti, Vasiliki Kitsigianis Ioannou, and Jheyda McGarrell, by clicking here.