Sherese Francis

Sherese Francis (she/they) describes themselves as an AlkyMist of the I-Magination, finding expression through poetry, interdisciplinary arts (collage, book and paper arts, sound and performance art, text art), workshop facilitation, editing, and literary curation. Her(e) work takes inspiration from her(e) Afro-Caribbean heritage (Barbados and Dominica), and studies in Afrofuturism and Black Speculative Arts, mythology and etymology.

Some of their work has been published in Women’s Studies Quarterly, Furious Flower, Obsidian, Rootwork Journal, The Caribbean Writer, The Operating System, Cosmonauts Avenue, No Dear, Apex Magazine, Bone Bouquet, African Voices, Newtown Literary, and Free Verse. Additionally, Sherese has published four chapbooks, Lucy’s Bone Scrolls (Three Legged Elephant, 2017), Variations on Sett/ling Seed/ling (Harlequin Creature, 2018), Recycling a Why That Rules Over My Sacred Sight (DoubleCross Press, 2021) and Lady Liberty Smashing Stones (THRASH Press, 2022), and edited a poetry anthology/guided journal, Baby Suggs and a Purple Butterfly (Get Fresh Books, 2024). Sherese won Inverted Syntax’s 2024 Aggrey Book Prize for Poetry for PollyNation: A Seminary of Self, which will be published in 2027.

Sherese has received grants and awards from Queens Council on the Arts, NYFA, NYSCA and The Caribbean Writer, residencies from WorksonWater, LMCC, Akademie Schloss Solitude and SeaSalted Honey in Senegal, and fellowships from Voodoonauts, Baldwin for the Arts and Anaphora Arts. 

Photo Credit: Rosayln Fernandez