About

A person with short hair and crossed tattooed arms wearing a black shirt leans against a sun dappled yellow wall.

Queer, transmasc nonbinary writer Tennison S. Black is the author of Survival Strategies (winning selection of the National Poetry Series, and best AZ poetry 2024 by the NM-AZ Book Awards, out of UGA Press 2023). Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in SWWIM, Hotel Amerika, Booth, Wordgathering, and New Mobility, among others. Black received their MFA at Arizona State University. They are also the editor of the anthology on contemporary disability, A Body You Talk To.

It is with immense gratitude that they’ve received support in this work through the Virginia G. Piper Center, VCCA, and countless friends and loves who also deserve space in their bio.

Black has taught or spoken on creative writing (poetry and fiction), and/or publishing at Western Washington University, Arizona State University, Perryville Women’s Prison, The National University of Singapore, and at a host of engagements or conferences such as AWP, among others.

Though Sonoran born, Tennison Black resides in Washington State and teaches writing at Arizona State University.

(Many of the author photos on this site are courtesy of the extremely talented Cocoa Laney.)