New York, NY (September 29, 2025)
The Poetry Coalition, a national alliance of nearly thirty poetry organizations, is pleased to announce the 2025–26 cohort of its Fellowship Program. Nine aspiring literary leaders have been selected to receive paid fellowships and career development opportunities, each at the following host organizations within the Poetry Coalition: Asian American Writers’ Workshop, Beyond Baroque, Kundiman, Lambda Literary, Mizna, The Poetry Center at San Francisco State University, Poetry Society of America, Woodland Pattern, and Youth Speaks.
“Nurturing the next generation of literary leaders is essential to the vitality of the nonprofit sector and to the ever-expanding diversity of American poetry,” said Tess O’Dwyer, Board Chair of the Academy of American Poets. “We thank the Mellon Foundation for its visionary support of the Poetry Coalition Fellowship Program, and we congratulate the 2025–26 Fellows whose voices reflect a broad and dynamic future for poetry—one deeply connected to the needs and values of a myriad of communities.”
Founded in 2016, the Poetry Coalition works together to reach more than thirty million individuals annually and cultivates readers, writers, and arts participants from all backgrounds through cutting-edge programs on poetry and community. Fellows work part time in literary nonprofits and receive $20,000 stipends, health care allowance, and a robust offering of professional development opportunities for their activities.
The Poetry Coalition’s 2025–26 Fellows:
Tamara Al-Qaisi-Coleman is a biracial Muslim writer, historian, poet, and artist. Her first book of poetry The Raven, The Bayou, & The Willow, was released by FlowerSong Press in 2022. She is a Brooklyn Poets Fellow, a Rad(ical) Poetry Fellow, and a Best of the Net Prize nominee. Hosted by Mizna.
Nairobi Williese Barnes is a poet, artist, and activist. Her creative journey has included producing educational videos with KQED and PBS that explore voting rights, discrimination against Black women, and the cultural significance of Black hair. As Oakland’s 2023 Youth Poet Laureate, Barnes has traveled across the Bay Area, leading poetry workshops in schools. Hosted by Youth Speaks.
Barbara Fant is the author of three poetry collections: Joy in the Belly of a Riot (HarperCollins/Moore Black Press, 2025); Mouths of Garden (Sundress Publications, 2022); and Paint, Inside Out (Penmanship Books, 2010). She is a Women of the World Poetry Slam Finalist. Fant has had residencies in both Cuba and Senegal and her work has been commissioned by more than twenty organizations. For over fifteen years, she has led healing-informed poetry workshops for youth and adults who are incarcerated, adults in recovery, and survivors of human trafficking and domestic violence. Hosted by Beyond Baroque.
Ae Hee Lee is the author of ASTERISM (Tupelo Press, 2024), which was selected for the 2022 Dorset Prize, and the poetry chapbooks Connotary (Bull City Press, 2021); Dear bear (Platypus Press, 2021); and Bedtime // Riverbed (Compound Press, 2017). She has received scholarships and honors from the Academy of American Poets, the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP), Bread Loaf, and Sewanee Writers’ Conference, among other organizations. Hosted by Woodland Pattern.
Rishona Michael’s work has appeared in or is forthcoming from No, Dear, Sho Journal, Poets.org, Black Warrior Review, and other publications. She has received support from Sundress Academy for the Arts. Michael serves as a reader for Pigeon Pages and teaches poetry courses through GrubStreet. Hosted by Kundiman.
Aisha Khan is a poet and artist, whose work has appeared in Womanly Magazine. Khan is currently assembling her debut poetry collection, titled Ritoru Shi. She is an MS candidate at Pratt Institute’s School of Information and was recently a fellow at The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Thomas J. Watson Library. Hosted by Asian American Writers’ Workshop.
Susanne Salehi is an Iranian American writer and editor. A Lambda Literary Emerging LGBTQ Voices Fellow and a regular contributor at The Lesbrary, their work appears in the forthcoming Nearest and Dearest: an anthology of dyke domesticity (Combos Press) and By Her Sword: A Sapphic Fantasy Romance Anthology (Sunset Wave Press, 2025). Their work has also been featured in Fruitslice and Frazzled Lit. Salehi is currently finishing their MFA at Emerson College, and is working on their first novel. Hosted by Lambda Literary.
Cydni Thompson is a Black poet who is currently pursuing her MFA in poetry at Queens College. Her work can be found in Bear Review, trampset, No, Dear, and elsewhere. Hosted by Poetry Society of America.
About the Academy of American Poets
The Academy of American Poets is a leading publisher of contemporary poetry across the United States. The organization annually awards $1.3+ million to more than two hundred poets at various stages of their careers through its prize program. It also produces Poets.org, the world’s largest publicly funded website for poets and poetry; established and organizes National Poetry Month each April; publishes the Poem-a-Day series and American Poets magazine; provides free resources to educators; hosts an annual series of poetry readings and special events; and coordinates a national Poetry Coalition that promotes the value poets bring to our culture. To learn more about the Academy of American Poets, visit poets.org.
About the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is the United States’ largest supporter of the arts and humanities. Since 1969, the Foundation has been guided by its core belief that the humanities and arts are essential to human understanding. The Foundation believes that the arts and humanities are where we express our complex humanity, and that everyone deserves the beauty, transcendence, and freedom that can be found there. Through its grants, the Mellon Foundation seeks to build just communities enriched by meaning and empowered by critical thinking, where ideas and imagination can thrive. Learn more at mellon.org.