Abena Beloved Green (aka Roots n’ Rhythm) is an award-winning multi-disciplinary artist. As a poet and spoken word artist, she is a two-time Halifax Slam team member and was a Canadian Individual Poetry Slam finalist. She won the Writer’s Federation of Nova Scotia’s Atlantic Writing Competition (now Nova Writes) poetry prize, and, as a recipient of Ontario Arts Council’s Word of Mouth grant she produced the spoken word album  Beloved. As a freelance writer and editor, her work has appeared in various websites and magazines including  Sway, Black to Business, Profile Halifax, The Service Mag (Rwanda), and Halifax Magazine. 

Abena also has over ten years of experience dancing and teaching traditional and modern West African Dances and step (also referred to as stomp). She founded the step team Lady Step and led the group for four years, and performed with the African Dance Ensemble in Toronto. 

Ode to the Unpraised: Stories and Lessons from Women I Know  is Abena’s latest book of poetry. Her poems explore the practical knowledge, life lessons, and personal essence of women in Canada and Ghana through conversation, prose, and poems. Those featured are located in Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Ghana. This book was born out of Abena’s curiosity about her late grandmother’s humble yet textured life as a wife, homemaker, and respected community member.

Abena lives in Kingston. 

Abena is supported by Author Patron Jo-Anne Lachapelle-Beyak.

Appearing in: WS2. How to Write for Performance

Website: www.abenagreen.ca
Book: https://nimbus.ca/store/ode-to-the-unpraised.html

Past Festival Appearances

2019: 37. Literary pub (s)crawl, 47. And the Journey Continues