Planet Earth Poetry, in partnership with the Victoria Arts Council is proud to present Tracy Wai de Boer & Tawahum Bige as part of the inaugural Queer Island Festival of the Arts. 

Please visit queerisland.ca for all of the fesitval events!

Poet Tawahum Bige

friday, June 6th Tawahum bige

Tawahum Bige is a Łutsek’e Dene, Plains Cree poet who has performed at countless spoken word festivals and had poems featured in numerous publications. Their debut poetry collection, Cut to Fortress, was published by Nightwood Editions in 2022. They reside on unceded Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh territory (Vancouver, BC).

In their second poetry collection, Tawahum Bige explores belonging and voice of a Two-Spirit Dene youth growing up in so-called “Surrey, BC,” far from his Łutselk’e Dene territories. The fundamental thrum in which vocal cords produce sound to whisper, cry, holler and laugh—these inner workings are made corporeal through moments of growth from childhood to young adulthood to show how the seeds sprouted for someone who needed to learn to express to find their path.

Poet Tracy Wai de Boer (photograph: Regina Akhankina)

friday, June 6th tracy wai de Boer

Tracy Wai de Boer is an award-winning writer and artist whose written and visual work has been featured internationally. She is the author of the chapbook, maybe, basically (Anstruther Press, 2020) and coauthor of Impact: Women Writing After Concussion (University of Alberta Press, 2021). Nostos is her debut poetry collection.

Taking its title from Ancient Greek, Nostos is a hero’s journey rooted in the quest for selfhood from elemental beginnings to an unknowable end. “Nostos” translates to homecoming and is one of the root words of nostalgia. The other, “algos,” means pain, making nostalgia a painful return home. This etymology acts as guide for de Boer’s “i” when she imagines homecoming as less a moment of arrival, but rather a desire to move through mystery in the formation of self.

Poet Melanie Siebert

HOST: Melanie Siebert

MELANIE SIEBERT is the author of two poetry collections: Signal Infinities and Deepwater Vee, which was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award. Her nonfiction book Heads Up: Changing Minds on Mental Health won the Lane Anderson Award for best science writing for young readers in Canada.

Melanie Siebert’s most recent poetry collection, Signal Infinities, explores the intelligences and limits of the body, as a therapist takes up an apprenticeship to a lake. As pain arrives. As glaciers and ancient forests disappear. With unbridled oxygen affinity, this work attunes to submerged sensations, reflexes and chemical shifts.