The spirit of Detroit shines bright through jessica Care moore. As a poet, recording artist, publisher, filmmaker, activist, educator, and mother, she radiates the hardworking essence of the city. With pride, she founded publishing house Moore Black Press, nonprofit Moore Art House, groundbreaking rock ’n’ roll movement Black WOMEN Rock!, and punk duo We Are Scorpio. The list goes on and on.
In exciting news for the city, moore has just been appointed as Detroit’s poet laureate, a title announced by Mayor Mike Duggan at a press conference last Tuesday.
She steps into the position as the third ever poet laureate in the city’s history, following Dudley Randall, who started the tradition in 1981, and Naomi Long Madgett, who served from 2001 until her passing in 2020.
In moore’s new role, she will spearhead unique events and programs throughout the city, deliver an annual address at the Detroit Public Library, and write poetry that resonates with Detroiters.
The Ford Foundation is sponsoring moore’s position as poet laureate, as well as a city historian who started in 2021, and a composer laureate that will be announced later this summer.
Metro Times spoke with moore over Zoom to learn about the new role.
The conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
What does being given the title of Detroit’s poet laureate mean to you?
“As a dreamy, young poet, you dream of ‘maybe I’ll be a poet laureate one day.’ Because of the type of poet that I am, and because I speak a lot of times to the core of the people’s conscience, you never think that you could be a poet laureate. Not in this country. You think they want people who are easy readers who don’t push back against extreme conservatism, like what’s happening with Diversity, Equity and Inclusion right now. That’s a big deal for me. I’m not just a poet. I’m also an educator. I’m also a scholar. I’m also a child of [the] Black Arts Movement. I also fought, when I was a student at Wayne State and Michigan State, for racial justice. That’s the core of who I am. You never think when you’re that person that you’ll get recognized, but if I’m going to be a poet laureate, this is the poet laureate I want to be, the poet laureate of Detroit. This is the work that I’ve been doing, representing my city for such a long time, even when I was in Brooklyn and living in Atlanta. I think I was in Atlanta, actually, when I got my ‘D’ tat on my arm, because I was missing home. It’s a different kind of importance because of how much I actually absolutely love the city. I’ve written about this city not because I wanted to become a poet laureate, I’ve just written about the city because what an incredible city to write about. I’m always reimagining, thinking about Detroit in the future, not just in the right now. It’s an extreme honor to represent Detroit. I’m really proud. Naomi Long Madgett, she was a mentor, known her since I was probably like 19, very young. I was doing Broadside Press workshops with her and she had Lotus Press, and I remember her telling me, ‘If you ever publish books, you start a press. Make sure your book has a perfect bind and your book looks like the other books in the bookstore. You have to have a good editor.’ I’ll never forget it. Then in 1997, I started Moore Black Press and I published my first book. I became an institution builder in the same vein of Lotus Press and Naomi Long Madgett. To not have a [new] poet laureate for 20 years, and then now me, is really beautiful. I was crying. It’s a blessing. I’m excited.”
For those who don’t know what a poet laureate is, what will you be doing in the role?
“I think the poet laureate depends on the poet laureate. I think it is what you make it. I think everyone takes on the position differently. What it will be for me? I know that I want to be a voice for young people in this city who are great poets inside these schools and in our communities. I want to build a poetry curriculum that’s embedded inside of Detroit Public Schools, in Detroit and Michigan schools in general, not just DPS, but all of them. We have to broaden the scope and we have to introduce poetry into the classroom. We can’t make it an ancient art form that doesn’t belong to you right now. I’d like to bring poetry into the right now. I want to do national campaigns to support literacy. The Moore Art House is my nonprofit. I only have one little grant so far, I’m just getting started this summer, but I’m excited with this new position that I’ll be able to use the position to push the programming I want to do [such as] intergenerational storytelling in neighborhoods, with open mics with our elders and with our young people. I want to do an international poetry festival — I want to bring the poet laureates to Detroit, and show off our city too. There’s a lot of poets who haven’t read here who are internationally and nationally known and I’m connected to all those poets. So I hope to be a connector in that way, a conduit to other writers who are really interested in our city. I’m excited and I’m grateful to the Ford Foundation for adding some grant money to it so it’s not just me working for free. People think poets like to work for free and we don’t. Poets need to work and it is work. For me, poetry is not just pretty words on paper, it’s actually the way you see the world. There’s a lot going on in the world right now to the point sometimes you can’t even write because you’re just frozen by what’s happening. Sonia Sanchez always said she’s ‘writing poems to find humanity’ because that’s what separates us from a dog or a tree or a garbage can. We’re always trying to peel back language so that we can find some humanity and we really need a lot more humanity on the planet right now.”
Why do you feel that mentorship and empowering the young people in the city is so important?
“Because I wouldn’t be here without it. Because I had it. Because when I moved to New York City, the Last Poets, who are like the godfathers of rap music, took me in. They’re like father figures to me and took me on the road with them and mentored me and so did women [poets], very well known storytellers from Howard University. I rolled with them. They saw my talent and they took me on the road and I opened for them. Sonia Sanchez has been a rock for me as a friend and she’ll be 90 years old this year. I learned from institution builders. So, I know that it’s important that I show up. I want to be inside schools and present and I want people to see that poetry is in the city in a different way during my two year tenure. We’ll see. I’m going to just push, push, push and see what happens.”
When did you first start doing poetry and how did you get started in Detroit’s poetry scene?
“I’ve been writing poetry for a long time. I was writing poetry in high school, but as far as getting on an open mic — I had gone to Michigan State, come home — I was on the hip-hop scene, I was not on the poetry scene. I came up when, rest in peace, Proof was alive and Baatin and I was running around with J Dilla. I used to work at the Hip Hop Shop and would go to a place called the Rhythm Kitchen and 1515 Broadway. I was reading poems at hip-hop spots; there weren’t big poetry spaces back then. Then, when I was in college at Wayne State in ’93, there was a place called the Pour Me Cafe on Grand River. It’s now a club called TV Lounge, but it used to be a poetry spot. I went from reading at the open mic to hosting and becoming a very popular poet before I moved to New York City, and I actually opened for the Last Poets when I was there. So, that was pretty much my startup of seeing the poetry community, but I spent more time on the hip-hop scene to be honest. I was an activist at Wayne State, so I was using poetry to get people to do things. It wasn’t about being this crafted great poet, it was about making change in my community. I started more in that space and I was a journalist and an activist. I moved to New York City in ’95 and that’s because I was a poet. I had an opportunity to be a full time news writer at that time with Channel 50. I was going into television journalism, I thought, and the weekend associate producer position was mine. I was in mind for it, still a student at Wayne State, and I didn’t really want it. I didn’t interview like I wanted it, and they knew that. I was like, ‘Oh, actually I think I want to move to New York City.’ And my life changed very fast, five months in I won Showtime at the Apollo five weeks in a row. People know this story, this is a story connected to my life and I haven’t done anything except become a poet, but the institution building in my imagination has kept me here for almost 30 years now. I can’t believe I’m a grown up. It’s ridiculous. I started quite young.”
How would you say that growing up in Detroit, as well as your adulthood in Detroit, has shaped your poetry?
“It made me fearless in a different kind of way. I moved to Brooklyn and I realized how country I was. The New York poets sounded so different from me. Being from Detroit and coming from a Black city kept me grounded and I’m grounded in a different kind of way because I grew up around culture. I grew up with a Black mayor. I’m a Coleman A. Young baby. All I knew — a loud talking, amazing, rabble-rouser, Dobbs hat-wearing [mayor] — he was gangster for me and that’s all I knew. My daddy was a big influence in my life. I grew up on a block full of Black fathers, that made a huge difference in my life, not just my own dad, but everybody had a daddy. I didn’t think that was a big deal. Noisy block in Detroit, house full of kids — we lived outside. I had such a good time growing up in Detroit. Being from Detroit is a thing. It’s so funny because everyone’s been texting me, my phone has not stopped for like two days. Dave Chappelle texted me and he said, ‘That sounds kind of cool being Poet Laureate of Detroit.’ I was like, ‘I know, that’s some gangster shit, right? That’s not normal.’”
“Shout out to Nandi Comer, I’ve known her since she was a little girl literally. I was so happy when she got appointed. We were laughing because she became the Michigan Poet Laureate for the state when I was the new voice of Pure Michigan. She goes, ‘Look at this man, isn’t it beautiful, a Black woman Pure Michigan voice and I’m the state poet laureate.’ I was like, ‘Let’s go!’ So now that I’m the Detroit poet laureate, which I wanted, we’re going to do some work together, we’re going to build. We’re going to take advantage of this moment. I’ve literally known Nandi since she was a little girl. I’m really proud of her. She’s a great poet.”
You’ve talked about the importance of this year being your father’s centennial. Why is that so powerful to you and how did he impact you as a poet?
“He’s my hero. He was a poet and he was a Cadillac-driving construction worker, cement-pouring, beautiful human being, great dancer. I am him in girl form. I am Tom’s daughter. He has been a light and an ancestor, if you believe in that kind of thing. He’s been with me through this whole journey. I lost him. I cry now like it happened yesterday because he was my heart. It broke my heart and that’s why I left Detroit because I didn’t want to be here anymore because he wasn’t. I was like, ‘I’m leaving. I’m out of here.’ My son, who is named after him, King Thomas, brought me back to Detroit. I knew the centennial year, I knew my daddy was gonna make things happen for me. My film is premiering, my world premiere is at the American Black Film Festival in Miami, then Detroit poet laureate. I sent in my nomination letter on my father’s birthday on purpose. I waited until March 12 to do it, because I was like, I’m gonna do this on my daddy’s birthday so I can have his energy with this nomination letter that I’m sending.’ He’s an important part of my upbringing.”
Music is also a big part of your life, with Black WOMEN Rock!, We Are Scorpio, etc. How do your poetry and music connect? Will music be a part of your programming as a poet laureate?
“Oh yeah, it has to be, poetry and music is everything. Now [poets] have a Grammy category, so We Are Scorpio will be nominated this year I hope. That record should be coming out sometime in June. We’re still waiting for the date for the vinyl to come out. It’s a punk rock record. If people know Patti Smith, I’m very Patti Smith with it on this record. She’s been a model for me as a poet and a rocker. My 20th anniversary of Black WOMEN Rock! is this year, and that’s not a poetry show. I’ve been recording since the ’90s. Music is very cathartic for me and it’s a way for me to get to audiences in a different way. I want to bring that music back out that I put out in 2015 through Talib’s label. I’m excited about this We are Scorpio piece. I mean lyrically, I figured out, I think for me, how to put poetry in tight verses with these great heavy rock ’n’ roll hooks. I’m excited, and we’re tentatively slated for the Fillmore. We’re still working out the details, but I want a marquee on Woodward. I don’t want to be in an auditorium. It’s a rock ’n’ roll concert for the 20th anniversary. I want to do it big, so a lot is coming.”
You often combine your poetry with activism. How are you going to use that energy to empower Detroiters?
“Poets are not supposed to just be here for rainbows and sunshine. There’s joy and celebratory lines in my work, but you have to be honest. Detroiters are real people, authentic people. I’ve said a line in my poem ‘Detroiters don’t do fake, we do work.’ We’re not surface people. We’re ‘up south’ people. We’re from Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi. We come from hard work. We come from, some of us, plantation work. My grandmother was born in the late 1800s and she died young. Think about the late 1800s in rural Alabama. That’s not easy living. So that is in my bloodline, that work and that hardship, is in my bloodline, so it’s in my work. When I write, I think about those people that had to do things that I didn’t have to do, but they saw me, I believe, saw me in the future. My people were West African and Indigenous, so Cherokee Indian and West African folks having babies, and that’s what we look like, that’s who we are, that’s the oral history. So, I take all those ancestors and bring them all with me to my work and a lot of Detroiters have that same story.”
How does it feel to be coming after Detroit’s last poet laureate Naomi Long Madgett? How do you feel that you will represent the city uniquely compared to her?
“Naomi Long Madgett was a legend and why it’s really special to me is because I knew her and because I have memories and because she inspired me to start Moore Black Press because of Lotus Press. I think she’d be pleased. She was supportive of my work and loved my poetry too and so we got to read together on more than one occasion. She was always very warm and sweet and she was an institution builder and so it feels right in that way. But also, what the mayor said during the press conference was, ‘This program is about a newer energy.’ Because she was an elder, she passed at 97, and she was still badass, let me just say, she was in her 90s and she walked up to the podium. So, that gives me inspiration that my work is just beginning. As grown up as I think I am, sometimes, I think about people like that and my other teacher, Sonia Sanchez, who’s turning 90 and say, ‘OK, maybe I’m just getting started.’ I think the difference would be that I’m younger, and that I have a lot of energy and and I care a lot, my heart is really in this city in a similar kind of way. I can go inside schools in a different kind of way. I think I have the energy and the wherewithal to actually care enough to show up in a different kind of way and I think that's the only difference. I don’t find myself much different than Naomi Long Madgett, very similar energy, just a different generation. I think that because I’m an interdisciplinary artist, because I am in the rock ’n’ roll space, connected to rock ’n’ roll, Black women who play rock ’n’ roll all over the world, because I am connected to hip-hop, it’s different. I recorded with Common and Talib and Jeezy and Nas, that’s a different space than some poets. I’m not confined to just reading inside of bookstores, and so the reach becomes different. Doing the corporate work that I’ve done with Stephen McGee for Pure Michigan, that campaign is a different kind of work. That corporate storytelling that I’ve been doing is interesting, like getting to the heart of things that corporations aren’t able to really do. Even their best marketing department can’t out-write me. I’m happy to say that I’m connected to an artist community that’s full of good people and I just hope to do more — big stuff, big things like the opera house, big stages, collaborative projects with musicians that puts poetry in a bigger space. I’m going to take haiku and put it all over the city, is what I’m gonna do.”
You talked a lot about what you want to do in this role, but is there anything else you want to add about what Detroiters can expect from you?
“I’m not going to be a quiet poet laureate. I’d love to know what people want out of me. I’ve been at this work for such a long time. I’m a community person. I’d like to see a shift in curriculum. Education is a big deal. I’d like a black box theater at every Detroit public school, because poetry and theater go hand in hand. I want to see this imbalance of resources inside schools stop. There’s people doing great things inside Detroit Public Schools. I’m only one person, so I must say this. I can’t do this by myself. The things I want to do, I’m looking for co-conspirators. I’m looking for comrades. I’m looking for help from other poets and writers and theater people, people who love the arts, who love visual art, interdisciplinary artists, musicians, so we really make an impact. I’m excited that there’s going to be a composer laureate, that’s gangster, go Detroit. Whoever this composer laureate is, I want to work with them. I want to work with our historian. We should all be finding ways to sit down and say, ‘How can we make something great happen in the city together?’ Then, I plan to be a conduit in the world. I want to represent Detroit in other places, which I have always done. I’m excited to represent Detroit in a big way, not just coming as jessica Care moore, but coming as the Detroit poet laureate. I’m really proud of that.”
