Canisia Lubrin “sings us into being … breathing us through these times with lyrical energy that is at once delicate and forceful.” – Juliane Okot Bitek

Canisia is a poet, teacher, editor and critic, born in St. Lucia. Her debut collection, Voodoo Hypothesis, was a CBC Best Poetry Book and her poetry collection augur was a finalist for the bpNichol Chapbook Award.

Canisia’s most recent publication, The Dysgraphxst, narrated by the character Jejune, powerfully explores selfhood and identity through language, geography, and history. The book “sings with a multitude of tongues… Settled in its marrow is a sense of loss—loss of selves, of country, of family, of a mother tongue, all transformed…, armed with this defiant blaze of being alive” says author Safiya Sinclair.

Canisia was a finalist for the Toronto Book Award for The Unpublished City: Vol 1 and was a Writer in Residence at Queen’s University in 2019. She teaches English and Creative Writing at Humber College, Sheridan College and the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies.

Appearing in: 11. Poetry for Where We Find Ourselves