At eight years previous, Kai Diata wrote their first poem. Now, at 19, they’re New York Metropolis’s Youth Poet Laureate.
Rising up in Mattress-Stuy, Brooklyn, Diata and their mom had been members of the New Black Arts Motion. The group, an area centered on Black liberation, impressed Diata, who wrote their first poem after listening to a gathering. From there, Diata’s journey of writing political poetry started.
With a visible artist mom, Diata was always surrounded by artists of their youth. Their mom engaged in participatory artwork, creating a chunk and permitting individuals so as to add to it. “Rising up, she was creating so much, and we’d go to a whole lot of areas,” Diata says. One in all these areas was The Laundromat Challenge, an arts group advancing artists and neighbors as change brokers of their respective communities. Publicity to a wide range of artists throughout mediums impressed Diata.
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“I had lots of people close by who [did] music. For a number of years, I’d do poetry, and I had a mini band, and we’d do it collectively. That might not have occurred with out neighborhood,” says Diata. Group group, STooPS hosts an annual occasion connecting Mattress-Stuy’s neighborhood with artwork accessibility and honoring native artists. At eight, Diata participated, sharing their poetry. As a primary foray into performing their work, taking part confirmed to Diata their have to carry out.
Diata’s training started at a homeschool co-op from age 5 by way of elementary college. With a Black history-focused curriculum, they realized about figures resembling Langston Hughes and Assata Shakur. “I really feel like that opened up the world of Black poetry as an entire,” Diata says. “It was like, ‘Ah, that is what that appears like.’”
Poetry and efficiency was paused nevertheless, when Diata started center college at Mark Twain Intermediate Faculty, as a substitute turning their focus to academia. They returned to poetry after seeing Mahogany L. Browne’s efficiency on the Lincoln Middle in 2023. “I bear in mind one particular night time the place I went to see Mahogany L. Browne on the Lincoln Middle, and that blew my thoughts. That modified my total perspective,” says Diata. “I simply noticed her on stage and the way in which she commanded area, even when she wasn’t telling a poem, when she wasn’t performing a poem, I [said], ‘I need to do this.’”
Brown’s efficiency pushed Diata to start out fascinated by what performing meant to them. “There was an city phrase slam. I used to be among the many 20 finalists for it, and I didn’t win. But it surely was unimaginable simply having the expertise. That’s after I actually realized how a lot efficiency is a facet.” They devoted themselves to writing extra and dealing in the direction of turning into the poet of their desires.
Just a few months after seeing Browne carry out, Diata acquired the chance to ask her a query at a panel. “I [asked], ‘As a younger poet in Brooklyn, in New York, the place ought to I am going? What ought to I do? How do I broaden?’ she stated, City Phrase,” says Diata. “For me, that locked it in. I [said], okay, that is what I have to do. So I discovered the Youth Poet Laureate program.”
Diata utilized to the Youth Poet Laureate program in 2023, incomes the spot of first runner-up within the competitors. “ I [said], ‘That is superb. That is cool. I’m a poet, and I need to win.’ So I did it yet one more 12 months.” In November 2024, Diata earned their official title as 2024 – 2025 New York Metropolis Youth Poet Laureate.
This position launched all the things for Diata. They proceed to construct a community of poets and are in a position to attend occasions to share their work in addition to proceed City Phrase’s mission of making change by way of civic engagement.
At the moment in a spot 12 months, Diata will attend Howard College subsequent fall. A poet who was runner up with them the primary 12 months they utilized to be the youth laureate attends Howard as nicely. “I’m hoping that I am going over there and we actually begin a brand new poetry scene or get into it and assist construct it.” Diata is worked up to additional take part within the DMV’s poetry neighborhood, particularly their slam scene. “Baltimore is understood for his or her poets, like New York. I received to go to them for a slam [poetry event], and I do know some individuals there. To me, Baltimore is the subsequent scene to navigate, to actually slam in and to construct neighborhood with, as a result of actually, ideally, none of us are separated.” For Diata, slam poetry is coaching for poets to speak their messages and observe activism by way of artwork.
They may speak about slam poetry tradition all day, if attainable. Diata holds pleasure to navigate extra of the slam poetry neighborhood and attempt to mend features of it.
“I really feel I’m always mending communities as a result of I’m one of many few youth poets within the slam scene,” says Diata. “There are only a few of us. I really feel I’m making an attempt to fix that neighborhood and youth with poetry generally, as a result of it’s such an grownup dominated and typically often male dominated area as nicely, even amongst Black individuals.”
Diata plans to shift dynamics with hopes to fix New York poetry with Baltimore poetry. Therapeutic communities by way of their work stays a part of their private mission and is one thing Diata will proceed to do inside their youth laureate position and past.
