A Conversation with
Joe Davis 

I interviewed author Joe Davis, Welsey Center's Spring 2026 artist and activist in residence, on April first in the Gathering Place inside Sorin Hall at Hamline University. Joe Davis is the author of Remind Me Again, a collection of fourty-one poems that inspire, challenge, and affirm readers from all stages of life. The SJBC (Social Justice Book Club), a new initiative of the Wesley Center, meets in the Gathering Place every Wednesday at five o’clock. The conversation between Joe Davis and I took approximately fifty minutes after a free dinner catered by immigrant-owned businesses, which takes place after every SJBC meeting. We pulled out a table and two chairs, and sat across from one another in the middle of the multi-faith room, which is behind the door in the back of the Gathering Place. The room was quiet and empty, then our conversation began. Joe spoke in a passionately rhythmic manner, and engaged with full attention as he spoke and listened throughout the conversation. 

Adrian Guider: What are some things that set you apart from other artists, or poets, or what are some things you think that differentiate you creatively? 

Joe Davis: What makes me stand out differently from other artists? I don't even have a stage name. It’s just Joe Davis, it's raw, real authentic, how you see it is how you get it, you know what I'm saying? So, I think a lot of times I just talk about my lived experiences and what I've gone through. What I've survived and how it connects with other people. It’s not to say that other people don't do that, but I don't have any aliases or monikers. 

Adrian Guider: Yeah, you’re just raw and real. I feel like that is unique. Who you are is your persona, your personality, because that's just you. That's your authentic self, so I feel like that's as unique as you can really be. 

Joe Davis: I would also say, I care a lot about facilitating conversation with other people. So I always say, I'm one voice of the collective many. When I show up, I'm representing my ancestors. I'm representing a lineage of people who've gone on before me, but I'm also being a bridge to connect the next generation, because I want to hear what other people are saying, what other people are doing and build on that. I care a lot about collectivism, like a larger movement beyond myself, because I know I have something unique to contribute, and I also know the only way that there's sustainable change in the world are these mass movements of justice and healing. 

Adrian Guider: Is there a moment that drew you into educating and the world of educating and mentorship? 

Joe Davis: I don't think it was one moment in particular. I think that when I was a kid I had different people in my life who would influence me, and they were the people who were educators, and mentors, and teachers, and preachers, and just like caregivers and people who I looked up to, I saw the way that they led, and then when I got older, I wanted to be like them, or they had already planted a seed in me that was growing, and so I think that's what was really formative for me, and I think there were some moments that were definitive, like being in the Twin Cities I've done a lot of community organizer training, and I had moments that really sparked that for me. Some folks don't know about Jamar Clark, but Jamar Clark was a black man, who was killed by police officers in north Minneapolis, and I live in the neighborhood where that happened, and so I remember driving home and seeing yellow tape and police lights, hearing sirens, I didn't know specifically what happened, but I knew that there was a pattern of things like that happening, but then something like that hit so close to home, that really sparked me to do something in my neighborhood. We started doing these open mics, these healing open mics, where people could come and they could grieve and they could say whatever they needed to say on the microphone. We did that for four years straight after that happened, every month we did open mic. We had Soul Bowl back then. Back then Soul Bowl wasn't even a restaurant, it was just my friend Gerard Klass and his wife, Brittany Klass, doing pop-ups, and they would come to open mics and give us food. So we did music, poetry, and food, and we did that for four years. I say that because I think that there were events, like what happened to Jamar Clark, that was a big one. People came out and camped out at the police precinct, and we were doing these different healing events, and I was a part of that. That was definitely a definitive moment for me. I could probably do a list of different things that happened, but like that was one of them for sure, that just changed the trajectory of the work that I was doing. 

Adrian Guider: What inspired you to start the Social Justice Book Club, and why did you choose your book Remind Me Again instead of Unearthing Us? 

Joe Davis: Big shout out to Chaplain Kelly. Her and I were in conversation about ways to connect with the students and get something moving, and so I was like, let's just do a book club. Let's have it centered on social justice, because that's what I'm all about, and I know a lot of students care about that too, and it's super relevant now with what's going on. I was thinking about the books that I have. I have three books, and I think, Remind Me Again feels like it connects the most to what we've been talking about because Unearthing Us is also a good one, but that really focuses on a relationship to the land. My family's from Jamaica and I would go out there, I would work on this pineapple farm out there, and that was the first time that I really got in touch with the dirt and with the Earth and growing something. I think people could relate to that too, but I have this book full of reminders about how to be human, how to be community, how to create space for healing and justice in the world. That felt more aligned with doing a book club that centers on social justice. 

Adrian Guider: I think Remind Me Again is very powerful, especially now, because it's like a reminder of yourself and what's going on around you and how to be a good member of your community. I think that's a really good choice. I would still love to read Unearthing Us. Is this the first year that you've done the Social Justice Book Club? 

Joe Davis: It is, yeah, I would love to keep doing it, it's been dope. I love it, man, it's really great, I love the conversation, multiple perspectives, like everyone offers something that's inspiring every single time. So yeah, I definitely want to keep doing it. 

Adrian Guider: What is something so far that you've learned or something that, like if the book club ended today you could walk away and say, this is something I got from doing this? 

Joe Davis: I love hearing how active each person is in their own field, like in their own sphere of influence. I've seen that throughout the time coming here, and even if someone's just jumping in for the first time, it's cool to hear their story and how they connect to the larger story. That's something that I really take with me. I used to get inspired by that, I love people, I love hearing about them, and so that's something I would want to be amplified. 

Adrian Guider: That reminds me of the first time I came here. A good friend I met when I got here was talking about how everyone has their own story, and everyone has their own lives, which I feel like sometimes we forget. 

Joe Davis: Yeah, there was a word like that. Limerence? 

Adrian Guider: Maybe, it’s something like where I would not be able to think of it off the top of my head. I think that's really interesting, I feel like we get to hear and share all these opinions and stories, and I think that's very powerful because we get lost in our own lives and what we have going on that we kind of forget, especially, I know me personally, I can drift off and forget that people have their own lives, and stories, and emotions, and feelings, and opinions about things. Another edition of how, and why, I think, Remind Me Again is very powerful. I do think if you do plan to do this again, I think it'd be cool to do this maybe with a different group of people, or if you stay here, touch on Unearthing Us. I mean you're talking about making another book. 

Joe Davis: I got a fourth one coming out. It’s not gonna be out till next year. I do want to mention, I love the student leadership because there've been times where I only come a couple times in a month, and so knowing that, whoever it's gonna be, is still contributing and still leading in different ways. I love that because to me, that's what it's all about. I got my expertise, I got my gifts, and my talents, and my wisdom that I offer, but so does everybody else. It should always be about leaders, building leaders. That’s even what makes movements work because you look at the history of mass movements for justice and if there's a leader like Dr King, or Malcolm X, Huey P. Newton, and they get assassinated, sometimes there’s a dispersion that occurs, but when there's a bunch of leaders coming together and everybody knows how to hold it down, it’s more unstoppable. That’s the generation we're in now, there's so many folks who are rising up as leaders. It's not just about one single charismatic personality, now everybody has a role and responsibility, and they're pushing forward this movement together. 

Adrian Guider: I completely agree. A group full of leaders, that's more powerful than one leader and a bunch of followers. Maybe you move on to other projects, and then this could still be a thing without you being here, could turn into something more. There's a lot of possibilities for what this book club could turn into. 

Joe Davis: Yeah, I wonder what other books people want to tap into, or the way I've done a group before where it was the same group of people every time, but at the top of every session, one person would be the leader, and they would bring some of their story, they would bring maybe like a text that influenced or inspired them, and they would talk about it for an hour. It would be that one person sharing, and then they would do a presentation, tell their story, and then the group would ask questions, and the next week it would be a new person who would offer something, and then people would go around and ask questions. I think that group had maybe, like, seven, eight, nine people. It went on for like nine weeks. It was really whatever was personal for them. They would share their own personal story, but then pull in other texts, movies, quotes poems to say this is who I am, this is what I care about, this is my story, and then afterwards, they would probably talk for half an hour or something like that and the other half an hour would be people asking questions, and at the very end, everyone did an affirmation like hey, I want to affirm this part of what you shared tonight really impacted me, and each person had something positive to offer. 

Adrian Guider: Yeah, then I guess I'll take from what we were talking about today with the three R's. 

Joe Davis: Relocation, redistribution, and what was the final one? It wasn’t repair was it? No, but she's talking about proximity to the problem, proximity to the people who were impacted the most, and you can't just barge into a community thinking you got the answer, you gotta actually be in relationship with people, and if you're not, then you gotta relocate, and then redistribute your resources that you have, your power, your privilege. I can’t remember what that last one was, but yeah. 

Adrian Guider: Getting an hour to live in other people's worlds, or their minds, I feel like that kind of relates to that in a way. 

Joe Davis:Absolutely. Yeah, we need more empathy, more compassion. I think people don't always have the opportunity to build that. 

Adrian Guider: Education I feel like is important, and also empathy is a really big thing because you can be educated on something, but lack the empathy to really feel and understand what that's like for them. 

Joe Davis: Education, empathy, I feel like there needs to be another E in there. 

Adrian Guider: Maybe that can be its own thing. Another question I have is, for someone like me who struggles with speaking up and kind of getting their thoughts across in a discussion or seminar space, what is some advice you would give? 

Joe Davis: Yeah, it's similar to what I said earlier, you're a creative, you do photography, music, there's other ways to express yourself outside of just using your voice. I think sometimes voice gets narrowly focused on just how you speak, but voice is also the way you communicate in other mediums, you’re still expressing your voice. I would say find an authentic, unapologetic way to express yourself. Maybe you already do have that, but whatever that is, lean into it because it doesn't have to look one way. Sometimes we get stuck, and think it has to be what we see, people out front, or in the streets, or on the screens, and especially as a speaker myself, I know I'm a gifted speaker., that’s my thing, but I always encourage people to find your thing, and that's what your unique particular contribution that can't nobody else do it like you. I'm not a photographer, I'm not out here doing some of the things that you're doing, that's not even like my thing at all, and you've been doing it long enough, you do it well, and you have a particular role and responsibility to communicate through that medium. So it's going to be different for each person, and it may even change over a lifetime, but find whatever that is and use that to the best of your ability. 

Adrian Guider: Okay, I'll definitely take that, and pocket that. 

Joe Davis: Absolutely, don’t minimize your voice, man, you're still doing it in powerful ways. 

Adrian Guider: Is there a moment where you were very doubtful about something, whether it be your career, a book you were writing, something where you were so doubtful, you felt like giving up, and how did you get yourself out of that situation? 

Joe Davis: Yeah, nah there's been waves, ebbs and flows. I definitely can be transparent, be vulnerable, and talk about how I've experienced anxiety and depression, just like anybody else I've had those struggles in my life. The biggest one was 2020. I got in a major funk in 2020 cause it was like everything was happening at once. Of course we all know it was the global pandemic, and then here in Minneapolis was the George Floyd uprising, even for me personally, I actually started going through a divorce. I was going through my own mental, emotional, spiritual heaviness, and sometimes I question, is this individual, or is this collective? Is it individual trauma or collective trauma? Is it individual grief or is it collective grief? Sometimes those things kind of bleed into each other, but that was a time where it was really heavy. Shout out to one of my friends and mentors, the sister named Dr. Joi Lewis, she was teaching these classes. It was called Calm in the Midst of Chaos or something like that. She's a local black educator, healer, speaker, and I consider her like one of the Village aunties. She was doing this class online, since nobody was meeting in person, and it grabbed my attention, because I had already seen her in years previous doing really beautiful work, especially in north Minneapolis, and she would have these talks, these healing circles and different things, and she was offering something online. I remember, I felt like I needed it, I felt kind of called to it, so I was like, yo, let me just tap in, see what she's talking about over here, and so I checked it out and it actually really opened me up. It was a course, like an online community where people from all over met together. It was mostly black folks to be honest, probably some non-black people in there too, but it was a lot of black folks coming together and just sharing our experiences, and she was guiding the whole process over the course of a couple of months, and she was giving us tools and practices, meditation and breathing, and ways to talk and reframe things. It seems really simple, deceptively simple, but I started doing the things that she was talking about and it started opening me up more and more, and I found some breakthrough moments, and that was actually the first time to be honest, that I started meditating. I'm a real big advocate for meditation, and that was the first time that I really started to practice it seriously was cause of her. That’s funny, I'm just realizing that now, that was a big catalyst. That was a moment for me where it helped me get out of my depression because she created that space, that community and gave us some wellness tools. Some of the things I still use to this day.It's funny man, you helped me make that connection. I forgot about that, about Dr. Joi and the whole movement. 

Adrian Guider: Are there some practices from Remind Me Again that are your favorite, or some practices that you specifically use or value a lot in your day-to-day? 

Joe Davis: Absolutely! Yeah, so, I'm big into yoga, but I don't think people have to specifically do yoga as a whole. I think there's yogic principles or yogic movements, and breath work that people can take and apply. It seems really simple, but one of them is the hand-over-heart meditation. It's actually scientifically proven that when you put the palm of your hand over your heart, it starts to regulate your central nervous system. If you just put your hand over there for a while, and just let it sit, your heart's gonna start to regulate its rhythm and your whole nervous system is gonna start to settle. So do that long enough, listen to your breath, sometimes it helps to close your eyes and just really pay attention to it, and you'll start to see how everything starts to just melt away and cool and calm down. That's huge for me, the hand-over-heart meditation. 

Adrian Guider: Since you published, Remind Me Again, have there been any poems that the meanings have changed for you, or your perspectives or experiences have kind of shifted your view on the poems that you wrote? 

Joe Davis: Yeah for sure. I think I talked about it during the book club, Love Always. I read that last week actually. I think that one, at first when I first wrote it, I thought I was writing that for self-expression of love, like, love for myself to another, and how do I want to see more of that love out in the world, but then the more that I did this inner work and this healing work, I was like, yo, love isn't just about romantic. It's also about loving yourself. That to me, that's the foundation. When I was younger, I didn't know the importance of self-love and caring for myself until I started realizing that the way I treat myself is going to be reflected on my capacity to care for other people, and the more I can have those foundational practices and really prioritize my health, mental, emotional, and spiritual, then that deepens my capacity to love other people. The Love Always poem became not just about loving someone else, but also loving myself, so that I can love other people. 

Adrian Guider: Yeah, we touched on that last week, I remember us talking about how we shift these poems, and how we view them. When we were reading that and talking about that, I was thinking of reading the poem to yourself in a mirror or speaking that out to someone else, and like you said, language is important, and I feel like the way we articulate and use language, whether that be directed towards us, or at other people. That poem was for sure one of the ones that resonated with me, and then today, the one about patients, because I find myself being very impatient, and I feel that being aware and reminding myself that things take time is important. 

Joe Davis: Yeah, it's tough. It's a lifelong practice. Just because I wrote it, don't mean I mastered it. 

Adrian Guider: Even in a relationship, being patient, it's a very fundamental skill that I'm definitely going to be working on. 

Joe Davis: Yeah, I was just talking to my partner this week. We were both saying how we're still learning each other. We use the word training, but not in a negative connotation, we’re love training. You can be with someone for a very long time and still learn new things about them and say, I'm learning how to communicate better, I'm learning how to be sensitive to your insecurities, and vice versa. I think when you really care in a relationship, you're never going to stop learning, you’re never going to stop training, and evolving in how to treat, because we change as human beings so you can be with someone for ten, twenty, thirty years and that's not going to be the same person you were with at the beginning, and so you're always learning and relearning yourself and them, and that takes patience. The point that I was getting to was, to learn it takes a lot of patience because you're gonna mess up, you’re gonna say the wrong thing, and do the wrong thing, but if you have grace and patience you can make it through almost anything. 

Adrian Guider: Yeah, that's something I've been thinking about and implementing in my relationship, learning and trying to be patient. That really does go a long way. It's really good for your mental health overall, because patient people, in my mind, are calm people. Because they’re not constantly waiting, or anticipating so much, you're kind of just letting things flow and take that time that they need. 

Joe Davis:That’s real. 

Adrian Guider: Is there anything about the book that you would change? 

Joe Davis: I was really intentional. I poured my heart and soul into it, and I took my time with it and really wanted to put forth something that I could feel proud of, I could feel like I meant every word and it aligned. Sometimes I'll go back and maybe want to edit a couple of the lines here and there, but I think the overall message, the heart of it, would still be there regardless. 

Adrian Guider: Was there any anxiety or pressure with the publishing process, and maybe not so much with this book, but even with your first book? 

Joe Davis: Definitely, I think both times. The first time I was nervous because I'm primarily a spoken word artist, so a lot of my work is on stages and I'm speaking, and I can get that immediate feedback from people, and I can see if I'm making that connection, or what I'm saying is landing. Whereas when it's on the page I'm like, does this even make sense to people? So when they asked me to publish, I was really intimidated by the whole process, and if it was even gonna land and work for people. Thankfully it was impactful, and I actually sold like twenty thousand copies, and it went crazy. The publishing company was loving it, and that's why they even wanted me to do a second one. So the second time, I was nervous for a different reason, I was like, dang, am I supposed to outdo what I did last time? I put pressure on myself to live up to this high standard, but I did eventually find this rhythm and this space of being like, I’m just gonna speak truth and just be unapologetic, be authentic. Share what I feel is feeding my soul and what is nourishing for me and for the people that I'm with. If I come from that place I can't go wrong to know what’s gonna connect with people. So that's what I did, and thankfully that one came out to be something beautiful and powerful as well. Whenever you care about something, you're gonna get nervous, even the third book I was nervous. I'm nervous about this fourth book. So I think the nerves don’t absolutely go away. I can't tell you how not to be afraid, but you can be afraid and do it anyway. Yeah I have fear and insecurity, but it's mission over mood. I got a mission, I'm gonna do it regardless of how I'm feeling. Just stay the course, stay consistent, stay disciplined. 

Adrian Guider: That pressure, I feel like it can sometimes stop me from creating or putting something out there because of the fear of judgement. I've recently started to not compare my work or style to other people because I feel like that's very detrimental to not only wanting to do it, but also the final result. 

Joe Davis: Comparison is the thief of joy. 

Adrian Guider: Yes, that was the quote I was thinking out there. Comparison is the thief of joy for sure. It steals your enthusiasm to create. You see someone made a gourmet dish, and here you are wanting to do something similar, and you're like, oh man I can never do that. 

Joe Davis: Right, even though yours is probably gonna be fire for different reasons. 

Adrian Guider: Yeah, it might be, and different is not bad. 

Joe Davis: I use the word authenticity a lot and the reason why is because that's been the key to almost every single success in my life, because I think when you’re authentic, that's when whatever is for you, can align with you. If you’re being unauthentic, you're trying to be like someone else, you're trying to do something that's not really part of who you are, then you're gonna line up with what's not really for you, and it’s gonna be whack and off kilter. But if you're like, this is a true expression of my soul, of my mind, of my heart, and then people who are attracted to that, who resonate with that, are gonna come, and they're gonna support, and they're gonna be part of that community, part of that movement, part of that culture. So, even for you, as you're saying you want to put your work out there, people who are meant to rock with you are gonna rock with you because they're gonna be like, yo what you did was dope, I felt that, I connected with that. You just gotta be true to yourself and be authentic and everything else is going to fall into place. 

Adrian Guider: I appreciate that. I appreciate those words. Since you've said that authenticity has been your driving force and key to your success, has there been a point then where you weren't authentic, and then you were like, wait, I need to do things a little differently, or has it always been that being authentic is the way to go about things? 

Joe Davis: For the most part it's been, let me stay true to myself. It was instilled in me at an early age by my family and my community, but I can think of some times where I got swallowed up in what I was doing, to give an example, I stepped away from some of the racial justice work I was doing with one of my good friends, David Scheer. He's like a white hip-hop artist, and so we do hip-hop together. We would do racial justice work, and we would do a concert and have a conversation about racial justice, and we did that for years and years, and we still do it sometimes, but I took a break because what I realized is, there would be times where I would filter myself, or not say things the way that I actually wanted to say it because I was talking in front of an audience that I felt wouldn't understand me or wouldn't receive what I was saying. So I would start to censor myself, and I didn't even do it on purpose, and then I looked back, and I was like, I would have went a little bit harder, I would have said something different if I was really comfortable, if I really just let my guard down, and so I started seeing that I was kind of dimming my light a little bit. I was kind of minimizing myself, and it wasn't on purpose, so I had a conversation with my boy, Dave, and I was like, hey, I still want to do this work with you, but I just got to change the way that I do it, I'll still come in, but I'll come in either at the beginning or at the end because he'll do more of the emotional labor of talking to white folks. As a white man, he'll talk to the white folks and I'll come in and share my experience, but I can do it in a way where I feel I have more spaciousness and more freedom, and just say, hey, this is me, and yall can deal with it, imma go now. I just do what I gotta do and then boom, he can tend to whatever people are navigating, because sometimes people get triggered, just by me telling the story of when I got pulled over by a police officer, or when I had a racist encounter at the grocery store where somebody called me the n-word, stuff that just happens. I'm just sharing my story, but people will get weird about it. They want to ask questions that feel intrusive. 

Adrian Guider: They would devalue or try to break down what really happened and try to change the narrative? 

Joe Davis: Absolutely, it becomes exploitative or extractive where, either they don't believe me, or they're questioning it because it's shifting their whole paradigm, for instance, let's say, a white person grows up and they don't have the same type of experiences that I have, and so they hear it for the first time in their lives. I got a list of all the things that happened to me, and they're like, what, that's really the way the world is, it can't be, I’m a nice person, I got good intent, and I want to love everybody, and I'm like, that's true, I believe you, that's beautiful, keep being like that, and these experiences that I had really happened to me, and they still happen to me all the time. Just because you had your experiences, that doesn't negate my experiences. Then I’m defending my pain, and I’m explaining my pain, I don't want to have to do that. So now, we've designed it in a way where all I have to do is just say what I gotta say and I'll leave, and he'll deal with that. 

Adrian Guider: Do you regularly avoid triggering people and/or softening your words to get the message through in a way that won't affect people as much? 

Joe Davis: I think it's about knowing the audience. I use different strategies and tactics depending on who I'm talking to. I always want to be authentic, but also think about what's appropriate and authentic. So the example I give is, I’m not going to say the same thing to my eighty-year old grandma, as I'm going to say to my eight-year-old niece. I’ll still be authentic because I love them, they're my family. I'm still gonna be raw and real with both of them, but I'm gonna change how I say it to my grandma rather than how I say it to my niece, and it doesn't mean I'm changing who I am. Like if you're speaking a different language, someone's a Spanish speaker, you're not going to speak English to them because they're not going to understand, it's not going to be mutually intelligible. So I’ll change it in that regard, and then I’ll also offer a content warning or trigger warning, like this may contain some traumatic imagery, or recounting a traumatic experience, the intention is not to re-traumatize anybody. Practice self-care, if you gotta leave the room or you don't want to listen to the story, it's all good. Do what you got to do. l won't take offense to it, It's not personal. I learned that through trial and error, because sometimes I went all in, just told this crazy story, and then I saw somebody crying, just breaking down because they had an experience that was similar. It just brought ‘em back to it, and so I learned I gotta offer that care, that sensitivity to the context, depending on what I'm talking about. 

Adrian Guider: I'll end it with one more question. This is gonna be an article, so my last question is, to whoever's reading this, what is something that you would tell them? It could be anything. 

Joe Davis: I would say, trust yourself, trust your heart, trust your spirit. I didn't always trust that deepest part of myself. I think there's times where I allowed people to make me doubt that I have self-doubt insecurities. So I would say, don't let nobody make you think that the truth that you know lives deep down inside of you isn't true because it is.

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To find out more about Joe Davis, check out his website: https://www.joedavispoetry.com/. To get involved with Social Justice initatives in the Welsey Center like the Social Justice Book Club discussed in this piece, please contact Asha Mohamed, Wesley Center's Social Justice Student Lead for new initiatives, through wesleycenter@hamline.edu.