SUNY Oneonta To Host Poetry Reading by Ashia Ajani

ONEONTA—Next week, author Ashia Ajani will read from her poetry collection, “Heirloom,” (2023) and share passages from her forthcoming novel, “Tending the Vines,” as part of SUNY Oneonta’s Red Dragon Reading Series. She will read at 7 p.m. on Monday, March 9 in the Fine Arts Building’s Hamblin Theatre.

According to a press release, Ajani lives and teaches in Oakland, California. Her writing has been featured in “Sierra,” “World Literature Today,” “Muzzle Magazine,” “Orion” and “Atmos,” among others, and has been used as educational material in university classrooms. She has taught both high-school and college classes, specializing in Black environmental literature. She also does community education through poetry and environmental education workshops.

Ajani is a recipient of fellowships from San Francisco’s Museum of the African Diaspora, Oak Spring Garden Foundation and the Just Buffalo Literary Center. Her book, “Tending the Vines” (forthcoming September 2026), is described as a kaleidoscope of her work as an eco-griot and abolitionist. Ajani’s poetry collection, “Heirloom,” will be available for purchase and signing at the reading, or in advance at the Green Toad Bookstore, 198 Main Street, Oneonta.

The reading is sponsored by the OEI Capek Family Fund for Inclusive Excellence and the SUNY Oneonta Department of English Red Dragon Reading Series.

The next Red Dragon Reading Series event features the renowned poet, memoirist, and fiction writer Alan Shapiro on Thursday, April 1 in the Martin-Mullen Gallery of the Fine Arts Building.

More information about the Red Dragon Reading Series is available at https://suny.oneonta.edu/english/public-events and from Dr. Sheena Mason, sheena.mason@oneonta.edu/.