Ariana Brown
@arianathepoet
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She/they. 31. Queer Black poet & virtual creative writing teacher. Now booking for college shows & workshops. More resources on my Patreon ⬇️
Houston, TX
Joined June 2009
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Hi, I’m Ariana Brown, a queer Black Mexican writer & spoken word poet! I write a lot about anti-Blackness in Mexican American spaces. I teach virtual creative writing classes. And I might be your college’s next guest speaker! Check out my offerings:
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A really cool thing happened today. The
@netflix
show Sex Education name dropped me and quoted one of my poems! I definitely did not expect to see my name onscreen while casually watching something — thanks for letting me know my work is reaching people. Happy Friday!
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You are not entitled to comfort. You are not supposed to be comfortable all the time. Safe? Absolutely. But being a good friend, partner, comrade—it all requires you to experience discomfort so that you can learn to be better to others.
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Most writing advice is actually *not* helpful! I’m thrilled that some of you can write every day, but my brain simply refuses. I’m actually quite alarmed at how much writing advice is just “suck it up and do it” without practical tips for neurodivergence or self-compassion.
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I want Macklemore to start a beef with Lin-Manuel Miranda. We deserve that
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can anyone recommend beginner level books + podcasts on socialism + communism? i am trying to learn more but am unsure where to start
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gloria anzaldúa was wrong about a lot of things and her book borderlands is based in eugenics! happy latinx heritage!
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Hi! I’m a queer Black mexican american poet from TX. I write a lot about loneliness, history, Blackness & girlhood.
I’m a freelancer with lots of free resources, poems, & essays on my Patreon:
Book me for readings & workshops:
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One of the reasons I don’t romanticize my heritage country in my poems is because Mexico, just like the U.S., is a settler colonial nation founded on genocide, African slavery, and white supremacy. My work asks: what does it mean to tie your cultural identity to violence?
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Reminder to self: sit with your feelings or they will consume you. Do not be scared of how deeply you feel. There is a bottom to every feeling, and then: a door.
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This book has me SHOOK. I’m so mad none of my writing classes assigned it to me. I feel like everyone should be studying this book’s use of language, dialogue, plot, characters, and storytelling. When I tell you I am hanging on by a THREAD—Gloria Naylor knew what she was doing.
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FOR WRITERS: Why building your own writing community is more important than chasing fame (thread 🧵)
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FOR WRITERS: Why research is fundamental to a creative writing practice 🧵
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HOLISTIC WRITING PRACTICES: Because our mentors should’ve taught us to be kinder to ourselves, so we could do this work sustainably 🧵
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I wrote a poem called “Alternate Names for Pelo Malo” bc Black folks deserve to have beautiful words to describe our hair in Spanish.
I was raised among non-Black Mexicans; I was never taught how to refer to Black hair in a positive or neutral way in Spanish. So I made a way!
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I want us to imagine what our artistic/writing practices could look like if they involved:
• pleasure
• predictable rhythms
• a variety of tools & resources that we could swap out when needed
• rest
• play
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ended my poetry class today by asking everyone to unmute and scream together
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THREAD: How to know if your writing is "good enough" 🧵
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For a long time, I was made to feel crazy for questioning why white Latines and mestizes called themselves "brown." Ppl called me ridiculous for pointing out that brownness does not operate the same way as Blackness, and is often anti-Black.
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what is the point of submitting to poetry journals when i can just publish poems on my patreon and actually get paid for them
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Today is the 2-year anniversary of my book We Are Owed, poems about Black life & history in Texas & Mexico.
This is my favorite thing I’ve ever written & I’m so proud of it. I wrote and researched for 6 years to write this. & published during a pandemic!
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Today I gave a virtual keynote that went so well I’m still emotional about it. I spoke to 100+ bilingual and ESL educators in my hometown about how the anti-Blackness in Mexican communities in San Antonio affected my desire to learn Spanish.
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So many of the students in my creative writing classes are dealing with negative self-talk due to this kind of advice. A lot of them think they are moral failures for not being able to write and read perfectly all the time. But I don’t think that’s feasible for most people!
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do I want to start a podcast or do I just want to talk to a group of friends at the same time every week
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Start taking care of your teeth and your feet, bc once you screw them up, you’re screwed for life pretty much. Supportive shoes & regular flossing will prevent so many issues later on.
what actually helpful advice do you wish you had been given in your 20s? not useless bullshit like "become a landlord" or "get 3 hobbies you can monetize" but useful information.
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read a poem about this last night & made some chicano studies folks upset. but please interrogate your idols. study outside your field. otherwise you’re just upholding white & mestizo supremacy.
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I just wrote the first page of my first novel. Please clap, I’m a poet who’s never written fiction before and I’m intimidated by the form, but I’m excited to learn. 🙏🏼
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Today is my birthday! I’m 30 🥳🎉
Venmo: arianathepoet
Bookshop wishlist:
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If you’re neurodivergent, low energy, you write with limitations, or traditional writing advice just doesn’t cut it for you,
you might be interested in my virtual summer class: Building a Sustainable Writing Practice!
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Honestly, I think a lot of writers should stop asking for feedback! Folks are usually looking for validation or praise—which is something you (& your trusted friends) can provide to you. But asking for feedback from others makes you vulnerable to mean critique & misunderstanding.
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this is not a secret. the book she bases her argument for mestizaje off of, la raza cósmica, is a eugenicist text. josé vasconcelos made no attempt to hide the fact that he was heavily inspired by the global eugenicist movement at the time
gloria anzaldúa was wrong about a lot of things and her book borderlands is based in eugenics! happy latinx heritage!
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MY BOOK IS FINALLY HERE!!! Celebrate with me during the free virtual launch events this week on YouTube Live!
Thurs 7pm CT
Reading + Q&A
Fri 7pm CT
Interview
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I do not want to bond with other people based on our shared “mixed-ness.” I make it very clear that my allegiance is to Blackness and a liberated Black future, not mixed-ness, mestizaje, multiculturalism, or any other form of eugenics.
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hate to report that I have actually never seen non-monogamy done ethically 🤷🏽♀️
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I didn’t realize how much spray tan JLO is usually wearing until watching her Netflix doc. Her parents are white Latines. The pictures of her in childhood…let’s just say they do not match the brown-skinned woman in JLO’s movies.
Mestizaje is a trip.
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Today is a good day to read this poem
#HispanicHeritageMonth
#SomeOfYouAreNotBrown
#StopLyingToYourselves
from my book “We Are Owed.”
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I don’t have a Valentine this year but I do have floor seats to Beyoncé’s Renaissance concert in Houston so that’s basically the same thing.
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So many of us want to focus on how we have been discriminated against in the U.S. for having ties to a “foreign” place. And that’s real. But what’s also real is the fact that many of our heritage countries were founded on the same violent principles as the U.S. So now what?
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Mexican Americans are so reluctant to interrogate their relationship to MX, bc they want to simply be proud of being from there. Despite the fact that MX as a nation-state engages in the same white supremacist practices & beliefs as the U.S.
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I’m borrowing a lot of this language from
@KCDavisSays
and her gentle, compassionate advice on how to care for your home. It’s really helped me understand how deeply ableism and capitalism is embedded in the ways we think about our own worth in our daily lives.
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Same thing with convenience. Being a good friend, partner, comrade, teacher—they will all require you to experience inconvenience. This is part of growing up and learning how to show up for others. It’s inconvenient sometimes, of course.
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One of my biggest pet peeves is hearing folks say “show, don’t tell” in your writing. I appreciate figurative language as much as the next person, but a piece of writing doesn’t suddenly become better or more worthy simply because it uses a metaphor.
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This is a really great informative thread to educate yourself and others on why “genocide” is the correct term for what Palestinians are experiencing. Please read and share!
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Can y’all help me out? I’m looking for a full time remote job in the arts (creative writing, event coordinating, literary nonprofit) or a remote library position.
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FOR WRITERS: How to put together a poetry book (thread 🧵)
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I adopted a cat earlier this week. She is still very scared of me but I managed to take some pictures. Everybody say hi to Johnnie
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To be clear, I’m not ashamed of being Mexican. It’s just neutral to me. But Mexican nationalism actually *is* harmful, because Mexico is not a racial utopia full of happy brown people or a safe haven for oppressed people. It’s not that different from the U.S.
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I've said it before, I'll say it again: Mexican does not equal brown. Even brown Mexicans should interrogate their relationships to anti-Blackness. And all of us should interrogate our "pride" in being Mexican, if it means upholding the existence of the MX nation-state.
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How do we make art about our culture(s) without romanticizing them or ignoring the violence required to maintain the existence of nation-states? I think we can start by asking ourselves, “who am I without my heritage country?”
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do y’all have recommendations for poets writing about disability? (written by disabled poets / poets with disabilities)
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And I am so disappointed by Mexican American artists who want to pretend that Mexico is faultless, romantic, perfect, and without blame. You all are lying. Black people, Indigenous people, poor people, trans people, queer people living in MX know this. But you ignore them.
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One of my biggest pet peeves is when people say “thrift store” but they mean “vintage store.” Me and my budget know the difference. I would like you all to learn.
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Many writers, including myself, are taught to value others’ opinions about our work via the infamous MFA style workshop (which I hate & do not believe to be helpful in most cases). One of the reasons I can’t stand this model is because it often teaches writers to doubt ourselves.
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is it trauma, neurodivergence, or am i just hungry: a memoir
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Because here’s the thing: I am not proud of being Mexican. I am proud of being my mother’s daughter, being a person I can trust, being a good friend, being willing to learn, etc. But I can’t figure out how nationalism serves me. Mexico didn’t raise me, my mother did.
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Some books to read to understand the problems with Mexican nationalism & MX’s violent history:
• Brazilian is Not a Race by Wendy Treviño
• intergalactic travels by Alán Pelaez Lopez
• Recovering History, Constructing Race by Martha Menchaca
• The Legacy of Vicente Guerrero
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I want to be with somebody who has the emotional capacity to be a good partner to me.
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Hey friends. I appreciate y’all sending me job postings and residency applications but just so y’all know I plan to never leave Texas again. I will be in Houston til the end of my days, enjoying being with my community, family, and my cat. I am rooted now.
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I’m often lumped into the “Latinx” literary category, which, while accurate, does not communicate the fullness of my literary heritage. My biggest artistic influences are Black women writers, period.
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Today is my birthday! I am 31. Spending the day bonding with cats at a cat cafe and watching movies.
Here’s my book wishlist if you’d like to get me a gift:
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The idea of the lone writer is a myth! Every time we sit down to write, we are in the company of all the writers who came before us and all the folks still writing, whether or not they’ve become famous or successful doing it.
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I talk about all these things, including histories of enslaved Africans in MX, and the formation of Mex-Am identity in Texas, in my forthcoming poetry book, WE ARE OWED.
Pre-order yours at
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Sometimes I miss doing hot takes on Latinidad on this app but then I remember I don’t miss the anti-Black responses, having to block MECHA stans, and generally feeling anxious every time I open Twitter.
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just gonna go out on a limb here & say that I prefer it when white people write about anything BUT their privilege & the violence of whiteness. save that for your diary.
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I gave an artist talk tonight about my new book called “We Are Owed: Language and Liberation” and I feel like I was able to articulate the very clear political goals of my work. I am really proud of myself.
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THREAD: how to build your own writing community, especially without an MFA 🧵
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In my personal life, I am only interested in being in relationship with people who are willing to be honest, thoughtful, communicative, generous, and reliable. If you are not willing to be those things, I am not willing to permit you access to me.
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But here’s the thing: you CAN trust yourself. You were the one that brought you to writing. You are the one who holds the pen. You know what moves, interests, excites you. You already know what you want to make. The task ahead is not asking if others like what you make—
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The true task is asking if YOU like what you’re writing. Do YOU think it’s finished? Did you achieve your goals for the piece? Did you say what you wanted to say, in the way you wanted to say it? These are all things YOU can measure for yourself.
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Just taught a class session on how research (especially public libraries) can be extremely helpful for creative writers! And it was so exciting to see folks get excited about going to the library 😊
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Happy one month anniversary to We Are Owed.! My first full length poetry collection, on Black relationality in Mexican American spaces.
You can watch me perform poems from the book & answer audience questions from the launch event on my Patreon.
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Because I really do think our writing practices can be enjoyable, customizable, and something we look forward to doing. I think a key step is taking some of the pressure off of ourselves to be perfect.
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When you are encouraged to doubt your own instincts, it changes your relationship to your writing. You start to feel like you can’t trust yourself, like you’re not doing it right, like if you just write the way others want you to, maybe you’ll get the prizes & awards too.
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BREAKING NEWS!!!
my cat Johnnie finally let me pet her! woke up in the middle of the night to pee and touched her head briefly (she was in the bed with me). shorty immediately started purring and rolling around. repeated again this morning 😭😭😭
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Showing up in community w/ other writers means that you wholeheartedly support other people’s work. It means you study, teach, value, and respect your peers’ work. Not for the sake of what they do for you, but because you are genuinely passionate about other people & their work.
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Feeling emotional today because I’m really, deeply happy. I am finally living in a city that feels like home. Last night I facilitated an author talk at a community bookstore I love with a poet who I admire. Today I started my dream job teaching creative writing to teens.
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Wishing a Happy Father’s Day and Happy Juneteenth to my dad, Wilbert Brown III, a Black descendant of slaves from Galveston, TX. We lost him a few months before I was born. He would’ve been 51 years old this year. Love you, Dad. Wish I could’ve known you in this life.
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When I say “build your own writing community” I mean show up to writing spaces that already exist in your area (online, open mics, slams, etc.) and find like-minded people who you trust with all of you. People who share your values and are honest, kind, reliable.
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Honestly, once I started to understand my own neurodivergence and actively seek out community with other neurodivergent folks, I started becoming a lot more gentle and forgiving toward myself.
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I want to teach a virtual poetry class on putting a manuscript together (chapbook or full length). Would folks be interested in that?
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My cat, who hissed at me for our first three months together and was scared of everything, just started sleeping on my shoulder at night.
I woke up to her forehead pressed into my cheek 😭
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I’ll be honest and say that many typical writing workshops are not facilitated well. Often, the people giving you advice about your work are not qualified to do so (meaning they’re not your intended audience or they don’t have the cultural knowledge/insight to really be helpful).
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But the idea is that when you go the extra mile for others, you will have established deep connection that will hopefully be reciprocal.
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Hi I'm Ariana, a queer Black poet with 13 yrs experience teaching poetry. I'm teaching a 2-day generative poetry workshop next month on gender, desire, & memory, with prompts, an open mic, and Q&A on editing, publishing, and promoting work. Sliding scale!
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Last night, we had a packed, *masked* house celebrating the 2 year anniversary of my poetry book, We Are Owed. I am so grateful to be part of this community in Houston. We laughed, cried, and were deeply present with each other. And sold out of books!
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I'm really uncomfortable w/ being included in this article and w/ the way my work is written about. I feel tokenized as the only Black writer, my work is being used to somehow tie to BLM. The name of my first book is wrong in the article. Why am I included in this at all?
Aquí escribí sobre cuatro voces disidentes (y poderosas) desde el Valle:
@emmyemmaperez
@Vanessid
@irenelarasilva
y
@arianathepoet
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do men on dating apps know they have to ask questions too bc…that’s how a conversation works…?
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1. Add pleasure to your writing routine.
Snacks, comfy blankets, dance breaks, candles, mood lighting, fancy beverages, and rewards to look forward to. Harsh discipline works for some people but isn’t sustainable for most. Pleasure is more motivating than shame for most!
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If you enjoyed my book “We Are Owed.” can you please request that your local library purchase a copy of it for their collection? Most libraries have a “suggest for purchase” page on their website. I’m trying to get it in more libraries!
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