Poetry Walk at Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge

On Saturday, April 25, a group of LGBTQIA+ Oregon-based working-class artists and Future Prairie friends met at Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge to walk together with Portland poet Jaye Nasir.

​We wandered through the marsh and the woods, stopped to read poems, talked with strangers, meditated, identified plants, and got to know each other better. Red-winged blackbirds called from the cattails, we saw a turtle warming itself on a log, and found a huge mushroom! Jaye performed her poems at several points along the route.   

Jaye's poems spoke directly to the landscape. Her work circles memory, place, responsibility, nature, the future, and community. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Poetry Northwest, New Orleans Review, and Heaven Looks Like Us: Palestinian Poetry. She has received support from the McCormack Writing Center, Sitka Center for Arts and Ecology, Hedgebrook, and the Atticus Hotel. Her poem Palestine is a Place won the 2024 Sundress Publications Broadside Contest and was a runner-up for the 2024 Rhonda Gail Williford Award. Her speculative fiction chapbook, Full of Eyes Within, is available from The Fabulist. Her poetry also appears in the video game Life is Strange: Double Exposure, which still feels like one of those facts that deserves a second look. She is also delightful company on a muddy spring trail!

This walk was free to attend, and Jaye was paid, thanks to support from the Regional Arts & Culture Council!

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