April 16, 2015

Lucas Smiraldo is a Pacific Northwest writer, performing poet, and playwright with a CD (Voice of the Americas), a book (The Thing That Gathers), and a web series (Slam Town) to his credit. In April 2013 Smiraldo was named the fifth poet laureate for the city of Tacoma, Washington, for which he produced the “Laureate Listening” anthology, recording poetry from more than fifty voices representing the “spirit of place” through city neighborhoods and landmarks. In 2014 Smiraldo was chosen as artist in residence for the third National Race and Pedagogy Conference and convened a team of poets to act as “creative journalists” to capture the conversations and themes of the conference and present them as original poetic works. His website is www.vanillasoul.net.Photo credit: Patricia Albert

Elijah Muied, also known as “6 Deep the Messenger,” uses poetry to unite people in the movement of positive change and to take responsibility for their part in the problem and to make change. He is here to lend his voice to the struggle for real, positive change, to unify a nation of people (his people) who have been systematically trained to exist in a state of their own division—culturally, economically, and socially—to keep them from realizing the full and beautiful potential that lies dormant within their hearts and souls. Elijah has performed at numerous Seattle festivals and was a principal performer in the spoken-word event “Voice of the Americas” and the play “Projectiles.” He resides in Fircrest, Washington.

Photo credit: David L. Bennett II