ARIANA BROWN is an

Afromexicana poet from San Antonio, Texas. She is the recipient of the Andrew Julius Gutow Academy of American Poets Prize and was recently awarded the title of Best Poet at the 2014 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational, a national competition in which her team representing UT Austin, took first place. In 2015, she was awarded the title of "Best Poem" for her piece, "Invocation". Ariana is currently working on her first manuscript and pursuing a degree in African & African Diaspora Studies at UT Austin, where she co-founded Spitshine Poetry Slam in 2011. When she is not onstage, she is probably eating an avocado, listening to the Kumbia Kings, or validating brown girl rage in all its miraculous forms. Her work is forthcoming in the new anthology of Afro-Latin@ Poetry from Arte Público Press and in Huizache.

performer

booking inquiries: abrownpoetry@gmail.com

ARIANABROWN.COM

poet

The brilliance of Ariana Brown is her ability to

change the atmosphere with her voice. The

wonder of Ariana Brown is the way, in which, she

conjures a spectacular honesty out of any word

and commands it to break open all around her

listener. The beauty of Ariana Brown is the

unyieldingness of her narrative; it is something

for the heart to witness, and I am sorry for

anyone who is less than fortunate.

- Sasha Banks

2013 Button Poetry Chapbook finalist

“

Ariana Brown is a quiet storm with words and

the biggest heart on stage you will ever see.

She is poise and passion teaching you how to

value grace and color in one breath.

- Ebony Stewart

3-time Austin NeoSoul Slam Champion Ariana Brown speaks like gentle rain while her

poetry has the impact of rolling thunder.

- Amir Safi

2013 SoFried Indie Slam Champion ”

Ariana writes and reads her poetry the same way she

shows up in the world, deliberately and intentionally. She

reckons with what it means to be a brown girl, the ways in

which we have to insist on ourselves, and the vast

celebration of women, the ones we came from, and the

ones who have been too often pushed into the dustbin of

history. Ariana is thunderous. That should not be

confused with 'loud.' She proves that mountains can be

moved one low rumble at a time.

- Dominique Christina

2014 Women of the World Poetry Slam Champion

Ariana Brown is a necessary voice and force in our

communities. Her work is honest...it grapples, it paints, it

dances, it pulls you under, and into her many worlds, and

always, always insists on survival. She matters.

- Denice Frohman

2013 Women of the World Poetry Slam Champion

How does one lose an accent? coat the tongue in ice and watch the frosted muscle forget all

its memories?

Mexico, a country which once included a third of the United States, is home to the largest

Spanish speaking population in the world. My grandmother attended public school in Texas

in the fifties, before it was legal to speak her native tongue in a classroom. As a child, my

mother tells me I am “African American Mexican”. This means nothing to me. Often, she

instructs me to speak like I have heritage, respect, a mouth of my own. But in Texas,

Mexicans who speak Spanish are also called niggers.

1. Nigger wraps itself around the coils of my hair and speaks. The beginning of mirrors is the

beginning of the end. I am six years old and ending all over.

2. 48% of the world’s black population resides in Latin America.

3. The first time I heard mariachis was in a restaurant, or at a parade, or an outdoor theater

somewhere. I remember admiring the lone woman in the group, her green polyester, the way

she made her whole body a song, the whole song a mountain, her mouth a red sun spilling

with hurt.

4. Years later, at a play in my hometown of San Antonio, a stranger asks me a question in

Spanish. I answer, pronouncing each syllable with the pride I inherited.

Frustrating, how it is easier to communicate with a stranger than my own grandmother, that

despite four and a half years of Spanish classes, I am still afraid that in front of my family,

my shivering tongue will shake to a western rhythm, dry out, and die.

5. In Austin, it is normal to insult a Mexican street name, extract its religion and graze it

irreverently down to Gwad-uh-loop instead of troubling oneself with Guadalupe, the

patroness of Mexican people, la morena, dark like we are, sacred like our names have always

been.

6. I am always amazed that the ability to forget history is a choice for some people, instead

of an ancestral battle against hating the self and all its words for being.

7. Can you still be considered an immigrant if you are travelling to a place that was yours to

begin with?

8. When I correct other people’s Spanish, I am often met with a laugh and the occasional

“I’m white” as if that was an excuse to be anything but sorry.

9. Each letter in the Spanish alphabet will almost always make the same sound, no matter

what word it appears in. Despite the excuses, pronunciation is not difficult.

10. My mother’s favorite mariachi song is “Volver, Volver”, a story of unrequited love and

the desire to come home.

11. In times of crisis, the mouth will bake the air inside it, choose to remain silent to survive.

The slow heat produces a small sun. To keep the sun from breaking on its way out of the

mouth, the tongue must reacquaint itself with the work of legacy.

12. The work is never done.

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