Aja Monet

Aja Monet is a surrealist blues poetr storytellerr and organizer born and raised in Brooklynr NY. She won the legendary Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam poetry award title in 2007 and aja monet follows in the long legacy and tradition of poets participating and assembling in social movements. Her first full collection of poems is titledr My Mother Was a Freedom Fighter on Haymarket Books.

Her poems explore genderr racer migrationr and spirituality. In 2018r she was nominated for a NAACP Literary Award for Poetry and in 2019 was awarded the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Award for Poetry for her cultural organizing work in South Florida. aja monet cofounded a political home for artists and organizers calledr Smoke Signals Studio. She facilitates “Voices: Poetry for the Peopler” a workshop and collective in collaboration with Community Justice Project and Dream Defenders.

She is currently working on her next full collection of poems entitledr Florida Water. aja Monet also serves as the new Artistic Creative Director for V-Dayr a global movement to end violence against all women and girls.