Writing
When we move our focus from competition to contribution, life becomes a celebration.
Never try to defeat people. Just win their hearts.
Never try to defeat people. Just win their hearts.
I am humbled that you are interested in my writing.
Usually, I publish under my Cleis Abeni name.
I write to build insightful, warm-hearted relationships with the public. Storytelling—written, visualized, spoken, and physicalized—is my lifelong method to realize a caring, inquisitive and reflective world. Deep down, I am a just another poet smitten with narrative form and structure.
I would be grateful for all feedback on my essay entitled "Compass Me About With Songs of Deliverance," which was published in the Spring of 2018 in Re-Imagining Magazine.
Essays, Poems, and Fiction
My essays, poems, and fiction have appeared in 30-plus literary magazines and journals since 1988, including Re-Imagining Magazine; Prick of the Spindle; Capitol Black Arts Bulletin; Mountain Record: The Zen Practitioner's Journal; Transfaith; Dance Research Journal; Ploughshares; Good Foot Magazine; Fence Magazine; Identity Principle; Locus; Press Board Press Magazine; Spoon; Ploughshares; The New Baltimore Visitor; The Journal of Homosexuality; Urbanite; The Formalist; Columbus Alive; The James White Review; Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement; Hook; The Washington Review; Tomorrow Speculative Fiction Magazine; and several other venues.
Journalism
As a staff or freelance journalist, or as a staff or freelance copyeditor, I wrote or edited for VICE, The Advocate, Baltimore Alternative, National Minority Politics/Headway Magazine, Unspoken Magazine, Baltimore City Paper, Philadelphia City Paper, Baltimore Times, Columbus Alive, Emerge, Dance Magazine, Colours Magazine, and many other publications. As a journalist, I began as a city desk, news, and crime reporter and then broadened to cover the arts, politics, urban affairs, technology, human rights, public policy, education, and health.
In addition to my freelance journalism, I held the following positions as a staff journalist:
Baltimore Alternative and Unspoken Magazine
From 1988 to 1994, I was a part-time reporter and copyeditor for the Baltimore Alternative. The late William J. Urban (or Bill, as we affectionately called him) founded and published the paper in 1986. The paper quickly became one of the most dogged investigators of the AIDS epidemic in the greater Baltimore-Washington area as well as a fierce chronicler of under-reported stories about city politics and issues of injustice. I was proud to work for an openly gay publisher in the alternative media at a time when professional LGBT people faced grave peril and I learned a great deal from my newsroom colleagues' expertise and zeal in investigative reporting at the paper.
As a cub half-time reporter (working on the night shift) for the Baltimore Alternative, I focused mostly on two beats: city politics and education, and it was my prose that appeared in many of the publication's unsigned, hopefully level-headed and fair-minded digests about the latest city-wide legislative and political controversies. Bill later asked me to write about crime and performing arts for his short-lived long-form magazine, Unspoken Magazine.
Baltimore City Paper
From 1992-1995, I was a part-time reporter and editor for the Baltimore City Paper during Sono Motoyama’s editorship. While I began writing about city politics and crime, I eventually became the publication’s first dance critic, a position that then passed to a truly wonderful, pathbreaking writer named Chris Dohse (check out his writing here and here about NYC concert dance) on my recommendation when I left the city to move to Columbus, Ohio. During this period, my dear friend, the late Dawn C. Culbertson and I were the most prolific reporters on the business and the art of performance in the greater Baltimore area.
Philadelphia City Paper (and beyond)
Journalistic Beats
Since 1990, as a journalist, I have gravitated to four main beats (or areas of interest): 1. urban crime; 2. education; 3. performing arts (especially dance); and 4. gender and sexuality.
I feel very blessed to have written for great alternative publications in the Mid-Atlantic region long before standout journalists like the late David Carr made it an honor to be an alternative journalist. David began his work writing and editing for the Twin Cities Reader, Washington City Paper, and other non-mainstream publications outside of New York City.
Only one year apart in age, Bill Urban and David were friends and allies in the national alternative journalism world. As his national profile grew in the middle 1990s, I lost contact with David after Bill died. During that period, so many journalists and writers that I knew were dying of AIDS or drug abuse. Or, we were being laid off as payment for alternative journalism waned. In 1991, David gave me three of the best points of feedback that I have ever heard about being a journalist outside of the mainstream (and here I paraphrase):
Copywriting
From 1988-2013, I was also a freelance copywriter with Pendulum Press, Uniworld Group (WPP), and Berg Publishers, contributing marketing copy for food retailers, technology companies, and tourism organizations like Publix, Giant Eagle, Compaq, Penn Hills Resorts, GraceKennedy Ltd., Massy Group & P&O Princess Cruises. My copywriting aims to incisively tell the story of brands, connect customers to services, and build profitable interest in products. I contributed copywriting to food retailers, dining companies, cruise lines, hoteliers, greeting card companies, and more.
Speechwriting
I am humbled to have written and edited speeches, policy talks, commemoratives, and other public addresses for Richard Failla, Nell Carter, Bernard Taylor, Gregg Burge, Guy C. McElroy, Eldon W. Ward, David McReynolds, and several other dignitaries. As a speechwriter, I relish the opportunity to collaborate with leaders to effectuate the style, tone, approach, narrative voice, and content that reflects their unique public voice.
Recognitions
I am blessed and humbled to have been awarded three commemorations for my writing:
Today I am thinking of Langston Hughes' remarkable long poem cycle called "Montage of a Dream Deferred."
Usually, I publish under my Cleis Abeni name.
I write to build insightful, warm-hearted relationships with the public. Storytelling—written, visualized, spoken, and physicalized—is my lifelong method to realize a caring, inquisitive and reflective world. Deep down, I am a just another poet smitten with narrative form and structure.
I would be grateful for all feedback on my essay entitled "Compass Me About With Songs of Deliverance," which was published in the Spring of 2018 in Re-Imagining Magazine.
Essays, Poems, and Fiction
My essays, poems, and fiction have appeared in 30-plus literary magazines and journals since 1988, including Re-Imagining Magazine; Prick of the Spindle; Capitol Black Arts Bulletin; Mountain Record: The Zen Practitioner's Journal; Transfaith; Dance Research Journal; Ploughshares; Good Foot Magazine; Fence Magazine; Identity Principle; Locus; Press Board Press Magazine; Spoon; Ploughshares; The New Baltimore Visitor; The Journal of Homosexuality; Urbanite; The Formalist; Columbus Alive; The James White Review; Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement; Hook; The Washington Review; Tomorrow Speculative Fiction Magazine; and several other venues.
Journalism
As a staff or freelance journalist, or as a staff or freelance copyeditor, I wrote or edited for VICE, The Advocate, Baltimore Alternative, National Minority Politics/Headway Magazine, Unspoken Magazine, Baltimore City Paper, Philadelphia City Paper, Baltimore Times, Columbus Alive, Emerge, Dance Magazine, Colours Magazine, and many other publications. As a journalist, I began as a city desk, news, and crime reporter and then broadened to cover the arts, politics, urban affairs, technology, human rights, public policy, education, and health.
In addition to my freelance journalism, I held the following positions as a staff journalist:
Baltimore Alternative and Unspoken Magazine
From 1988 to 1994, I was a part-time reporter and copyeditor for the Baltimore Alternative. The late William J. Urban (or Bill, as we affectionately called him) founded and published the paper in 1986. The paper quickly became one of the most dogged investigators of the AIDS epidemic in the greater Baltimore-Washington area as well as a fierce chronicler of under-reported stories about city politics and issues of injustice. I was proud to work for an openly gay publisher in the alternative media at a time when professional LGBT people faced grave peril and I learned a great deal from my newsroom colleagues' expertise and zeal in investigative reporting at the paper.
As a cub half-time reporter (working on the night shift) for the Baltimore Alternative, I focused mostly on two beats: city politics and education, and it was my prose that appeared in many of the publication's unsigned, hopefully level-headed and fair-minded digests about the latest city-wide legislative and political controversies. Bill later asked me to write about crime and performing arts for his short-lived long-form magazine, Unspoken Magazine.
Baltimore City Paper
From 1992-1995, I was a part-time reporter and editor for the Baltimore City Paper during Sono Motoyama’s editorship. While I began writing about city politics and crime, I eventually became the publication’s first dance critic, a position that then passed to a truly wonderful, pathbreaking writer named Chris Dohse (check out his writing here and here about NYC concert dance) on my recommendation when I left the city to move to Columbus, Ohio. During this period, my dear friend, the late Dawn C. Culbertson and I were the most prolific reporters on the business and the art of performance in the greater Baltimore area.
Philadelphia City Paper (and beyond)
- From 1997 to 2001, I was either a half-time, a part-time, or a freelance reporter for the Philadelphia City Paper (during David Warner’s editorship) and I also covered performing arts for this publication.
- From 2014 to 2016, I was a contributing correspondent for The Advocate and I also edited opinion pieces for that publication.
Journalistic Beats
Since 1990, as a journalist, I have gravitated to four main beats (or areas of interest): 1. urban crime; 2. education; 3. performing arts (especially dance); and 4. gender and sexuality.
I feel very blessed to have written for great alternative publications in the Mid-Atlantic region long before standout journalists like the late David Carr made it an honor to be an alternative journalist. David began his work writing and editing for the Twin Cities Reader, Washington City Paper, and other non-mainstream publications outside of New York City.
Only one year apart in age, Bill Urban and David were friends and allies in the national alternative journalism world. As his national profile grew in the middle 1990s, I lost contact with David after Bill died. During that period, so many journalists and writers that I knew were dying of AIDS or drug abuse. Or, we were being laid off as payment for alternative journalism waned. In 1991, David gave me three of the best points of feedback that I have ever heard about being a journalist outside of the mainstream (and here I paraphrase):
- No matter what you write about or who you write for, investigate—deeply and accurately source, scrutinize, and describe the problem;
- Write accessibly for common, everyday readers; and
- Figure out the things that make your writing and your view distinctive; then don't be afraid to stand out from what everyone else is doing.
Copywriting
From 1988-2013, I was also a freelance copywriter with Pendulum Press, Uniworld Group (WPP), and Berg Publishers, contributing marketing copy for food retailers, technology companies, and tourism organizations like Publix, Giant Eagle, Compaq, Penn Hills Resorts, GraceKennedy Ltd., Massy Group & P&O Princess Cruises. My copywriting aims to incisively tell the story of brands, connect customers to services, and build profitable interest in products. I contributed copywriting to food retailers, dining companies, cruise lines, hoteliers, greeting card companies, and more.
Speechwriting
I am humbled to have written and edited speeches, policy talks, commemoratives, and other public addresses for Richard Failla, Nell Carter, Bernard Taylor, Gregg Burge, Guy C. McElroy, Eldon W. Ward, David McReynolds, and several other dignitaries. As a speechwriter, I relish the opportunity to collaborate with leaders to effectuate the style, tone, approach, narrative voice, and content that reflects their unique public voice.
Recognitions
I am blessed and humbled to have been awarded three commemorations for my writing:
- A 2001 Pushcart prize;
- A 2002 Maryland State Arts Council fellowship; and
- The Selma Jeanne Cohen Award from the Society of Dance History Scholars.
Today I am thinking of Langston Hughes' remarkable long poem cycle called "Montage of a Dream Deferred."