Cortney Lamar Charleston
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Cortney Lamar Charleston
@bardsbesidebars.bsky.social
1.9K followers 440 following 160 posts
Poet & Author
• TELEPATHOLOGIES (Saturnalia Books, 2017);
• DOPPELGANGBANGER (Haymarket Books, 2021);
• IT'S IMPORTANT I REMEMBER (Northwestern Univ. Press, 2026)
https://www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/important-links
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Tomorrow night at The New School in NYC. Come join us!
October 7, 2025 at 12:54 PM
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I'm elated to share the cover for my next poetry collection, It's Important I Remember, due out 2/15/2026 from Northwestern University Press and now available to pre-order. I pray that these words move you; may they be part of a movement toward one another and away from tyranny.
May 7, 2025 at 6:04 PM
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Poets! For the first time ever, I'm available for consultations on your full-length and chapbook manuscripts, as well as assorted packets. You can find details around services and pricing at the link in my bio. I look forward to working with you and delighting in your poems!
April 2, 2025 at 6:27 PM
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Some of my favorite love poems of all time (and I'm sure I'm not alone on these):

"Object Permanence" by Nicole Sealey

"Mountain Dew Commercial Disguised as a Love Poem" by Matthew Olzmann

"Love Poem Beginning with a Yellow Cab" by @joseolivarez.bsky.social
February 14, 2025 at 8:23 PM
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At the turn of the year, Poetry Northwest generously offered me the opportunity to highlight three poems from my forthcoming collection, IT'S IMPORTANT I REMEMBER. You can read an intro, the title poem and a second poem here. My profound gratitude goes to Keetje Kuipers and the entire staff.
January 24, 2025 at 8:48 PM
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Hey! I'm hoping to give away some poetry books to a pair of friends as part of the Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway (I gifted June Jordan's collected DIRECTED BY DESIRE in Oct). I'll draw winners 11/1. Find details on how to enter at the link.
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
October 28, 2024 at 8:29 PM
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October 22, 2024 at 4:28 PM
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I am fortunate to have two poems in the most recent issue of Massachusetts Review that recently became available online which reflect on mass incarceration and the 1985 MOVE bombing carried out by Philly police. May they offer something meaningful to you.
www.massreview.org/sites/defaul...
October 22, 2024 at 4:27 PM
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I haven't been as "online" lately, but I'm popping back on to share one of three new poems I have in the new issue of Waxwing! My sincere thanks goes to the editors for making room for my poems in one of my very favorite publications. Read the full poem at the link!
waxwingmag.org/items/issue3...
September 5, 2024 at 9:40 PM
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Three poems from my next collection have been made available by the good folks at ACTION, SPECTACLE! You can read one of them here ("It’s Important I Remember That Ella Baker Was Married to the Movement—") and the rest at the link. Hope you enjoy!
www.action-spectacle.com/summer-2024-...
August 23, 2024 at 7:30 PM
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There are three days left to enter the July 2024 Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway for a chance to win a free poetry book for you and a friend. You can find guidelines and an entry form at the link. 🙂
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
July 29, 2024 at 5:03 PM
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An oldie for today
June 28, 2024 at 9:09 PM
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I have hard work behind me and hard work ahead of me still. Nonetheless, I’m blessed to be able to bring this book to y’all. Thank you to Marisa Siegel, Parneshia Jones and Northwestern University Press for their belief in and partnership on this collection!
Award-winning poet and Cave Canem fellow Cortney Lamar Charleston’s IT’S IMPORTANT I REMEMBER, a third collection principally concerned with the ascent of neo-fascism in the United States which crescendoed most notably with the arrival of Donald Trump as a galvanizing political force and that aims to calm present anxieties about its ramifications through historical examinations and celebrations of Black resistance to state-sanctioned violence and oppression, to Marisa Siegel at Curbstone Books, for publication in early 2026 (world).
June 24, 2024 at 3:50 PM
bardsbesidebars.bsky.social
I had four poems appear in the latest issue of Mississippi Review this month. Here are two of them. And, yes, they are shaped like states.

Happy to share the text a different way if you need it since ALT char limits were insufficient. Hope you dig 'em.
March 19, 2024 at 6:34 PM
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Hey folks, I have a new poem as part of the February 2024 Poetry feature at The Common, a wonderful literary magazine, alongside Olena Jennings, Meghan McClure and Jonathan Fink. You can read it below or at the link. I hope you find something worthwhile in it.
www.thecommononline.org/february-202...
It’s Important I Remember That Fascism Didn’t Come to America, It Was Already Here— wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross. But the cross in question wasn’t literal: in his hand was a Bible turned upside down like the state device that martyred Saint Peter; the flag was a black-and-white replica of the national banner with a thin blue vein through the middle like one that parts a brow between rage and reason. There was tear gas deployed without a tear. There were rubber bullets fired from weapons that also fire lethal rounds. There were armored vehicles steering through the streets of the capital that stars our maps. What we saw was only new to the people it was new to. Some of us knew better. Been knew. What the word is to describe a J. Edgar Hoover. What the word is to describe a Eugene “Bull” Connor. What the word is to describe a Frank Rizzo or Richard J. Daley from where we stand, where the leaves of grass brown and brittle. Some of us have been to Wilmington, North Carolina before, where Air Jordan took flight from among other local luminaries under very different, desperate circumstances— sprinting from bullets, loose lumber and ropes as their government, democratic and dark of hue, was tossed aside. What the word is for this begins softly enough in our mouths, but that’s not how it ends as the teeth cut against it, teeth which keep the record of who we were for forensics to later identify. This is new to the people it’s new to, but some of us know better. Been known: if you ever see a flock of black birds scatter on the breeze, understand that the murders have started up again― again in the sense of active repetition. Repetition in the sense of continuing practice. Practice in the sense of attempting to perfect.
February 29, 2024 at 8:56 PM
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Tomorrow is 2/29, meaning you have an extra day to enter the February 2024 Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway before winners are selected on Friday. Get your ask in to win a book for you and a friend. Details and entry form at the link!
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
February 28, 2024 at 6:01 PM
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The February 2024 Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway is accepting entries through the end of the month. Read the rules and enter at the link to win a free poetry book of your choice for you and a friend!
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
February 16, 2024 at 7:28 PM
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It's officially Black History Month, y'all! Pick up this new joint edited by NYT Bestseller Kwame Alexander and get your spirit right for the occasion. Luminaries on luminaries in these pages.
Cover for poetry anthology. This Is the Honey: An Anthology of Contemporary Black Poets, edited by Kwame Alexander.
February 1, 2024 at 6:16 PM
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A poem to offer you, courtesy of Gulf Coat. A sort-of (twin) sonnet. A contrapuntal type of construct. A found poem halfway between what I read and what is really being said.
It's Important I Remember That the Majority of Americans Agree the Country Is on the Wrong Track— that democracy is the best system of government that democracy is under threat that people should voice their views without fear of reprisal that government can monitor our activities without warrants that there needs to be police reform that it can be necessary to sacrifice freedoms to fight terrorism that racism and discrimination are bad that calling all white people racist is not fair that students shouldn’t be taught whitewashed history that students shouldn't be made to feel guilty due to their race that the country benefits from the presence of immigrants that a system is needed to decide who can enter the country that legislation should be passed to protect DREAMers that America is in danger of losing its cultural identity that the country has been a force for good in the world that it is acceptable to work with autocrats if it protects us that high achievement should be expected of all people that there are underlying differences between men and women that a person’s gender needn’t conform to their biological sex that athletes should compete according to their biological sex that affordable housing is a problem where they live that to be a true American you must believe in capitalism that their neighbors are not their friends that there is diminishing civility in politics that the courts have become too political that to be a true American you must believe in God that America is not perfect that America is the greatest country on earth
January 17, 2024 at 5:41 PM
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The Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway for November is open for requests through the end of the month. Now would be a great time for you and a buddy to seek out work from Palestinian poets. Last month's winning selections and entry details are below.
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
Poetry Book Cover. Orders of Service by Willie Lee Kinard III. Features a Black male figure with their head tucked into their elbow, adorned by a halo-like gold ring, butterflies on their shoulder, and colors moving in ripple across their skin. Book cover for poetry collection. The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On by Franny Choi. Cover is mostly salmon colored, with rips exposing underlying collage/images. There are clouds, mountainside and city scape peeking through.
November 14, 2023 at 4:34 PM
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I share this for your reflection. What the Western world is sanctioning right now in Gaza is beyond horrifying.

All the hand-wringing about "both sides" without us considering the vast asymmetries in power, and the backing of said power by Western governments, makes us morally feckless.
From the United Nations Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect: As ethnic cleansing has not been recognized as an independent crime under international law, there is no precise definition of this concept or the exact acts to be qualified as ethnic cleansing. A United Nations Commission of Experts mandated to look into violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of the former Yugoslavia defined ethnic cleansing in its interim report S/25274 as "… rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of given groups from the area." In its final report S/1994/674, the same Commission described ethnic cleansing as “… a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic or religious group from certain geographic areas.” From the New York Times: Panic Grips Gaza as Israel Tells 1.1 Million to Leave North. U.N. Asks for Demand to Be Rescinded; Hamas Urges Defiance of It.
October 13, 2023 at 3:33 PM
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The October Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway is open for entries! I'll make one "standard" selection under the linked guidelines this month, but will prioritize additional giveaways for requested collections by poets of the Palestinian diaspora.
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
Flyer for Lights and Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway. Entry details accessible at the link: https://www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shadows-poetry-book-giveaway
October 11, 2023 at 10:16 PM
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I've got the new issue of New England Review in hand, so now I'm able to share my second poem in the issue: "It’s Important I Remember That Frederick Douglass Learned How to Read—"

Really hope you enjoy this one. I'm definitely proud of this poem and the larger project it is part of. 🙂
Photograph of the poem "It’s Important I Remember That Frederick Douglass Learned How to Read—" by Cortney Lamar Charleston, featured in New England Review Vol. 44.3. ALT text box has insufficient characters for sharing the entire poem, but you can reach out to the author at charleston.poetry@gmail.com if interested to receive the text in full. Photograph of the poem "It’s Important I Remember That Frederick Douglass Learned How to Read—" by Cortney Lamar Charleston, featured in New England Review Vol. 44.3. ALT text box has insufficient characters for sharing the entire poem, but you can reach out to the author at charleston.poetry@gmail.com if interested to receive the text in full.
October 4, 2023 at 8:36 PM
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October is here, and with it, you may newly enter the Lights & Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway and win yourself a free book for you and a buddy! Last month's winners selected the books below. What might you pick? Details and entry form are at the link:
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
Book covers for poetry collections. The first book cover, on the left, has a black border framing a painting with wilting flower blooms hanging from strings. This is the cover for BLACK PASTORAL by Ariana Benson. Second book cover, on the right, is largely in shades of grey with an impressionistic interpretation of a bird diving past a horizon line. This book is THE HURTING KIND by Ada Limón, Poet Laureate of the United States.
October 2, 2023 at 10:05 PM
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Friendly reminder: you have 3 days left to enter the September 2023 Lights and Shadows Poetry Book Giveaway. You can win a free book (of your choice) for you and a buddy! Details and entry form are at the link. The next winners will be selected 10/1.
www.cortneylamarcharleston.com/lights-shado...
Lights & Shadows: A Monthly Poetry Book Giveaway. Visit cortneylamarcharleston.com for details.
September 28, 2023 at 6:29 PM