Saba Keramati is a Chinese-Iranian writer from the San Francisco Bay Area.
Her debut poetry collection, Self-Mythology, was selected by Patricia Smith for publication in the Miller Williams Poetry Series at University of Arkansas Press, and is forthcoming in Spring 2024. A winner of the 2023 92NY Discovery Poetry Prize, Saba holds an MFA from UC Davis, where she was a Dean’s Graduate Fellow for Creative Arts. She is the Poetry Editor at Sundog Lit.
Education: MFA, University of California, English & Creative Writing; BA, University of Michigan, English Literature. Full CV here.
About my work.
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The power structures I interrogate in my work are white supremacy, the effects of colonization on the body, gendered expectations of womanhood, and the English language. I tend to start my work through the confessional mode, and work to widen my speaker’s gaze to capture her political and cultural landscape in addition to her own reflection.
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A sustainable writing practice requires a community. My dedication to poetry moves beyond my writing practice toward connection with those around me, whether that be physically or through a sustained commitment to writing. I consistently work to create communities for people, like myself, who may not have had access to poetry growing up. My goals as a teacher, editor, and poet are to bring poetry and creative expression to places where it might be unexpected.
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Some of my earliest introductions to poetry were through Black feminist activists, namely June Jordan and Lucille Clifton. Their language opened up new understandings of poetry and radical love. Other poets that influence me through the act of witnessing the political include Solmaz Sharif (“America, ignore the window and look at your lap”) and Denise Levertov (“The poets must give us imagination of peace, to oust the intense, familiar imagination of disaster”).
Awards + Critical Work + Appointments
winner, Sundress Publications Broadside Competition, selected by Sarah Clarke (2022)
Academy of American Poets Celeste Turner Wright Prize (Honorable Mention)
Elliot Gilbert Prize for Poetry, selected by Noah Warren
UC Davis Humanities Institute Fellowship
winner, Discovery Poetry Prize (2023)
semifinalist, Wisconsin Poetry Series' Brittingham and Felix Pollak Prizes (2023)
finalist, Texas Review Press X.J. Kennedy Poetry Prize (2022)
semifinalist, Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize (2022)
Awards
Hayden’s Ferry Review | speaker, “Tiny Architectures” Craft Chat
"Radius of Arab American Writers RAWIfest | panelist, “Iranian American Women Writers in Conversation”
University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire & Chippewa Valley Writers Guild | craft talk, “Kickstart Your Writing: Experiments and Forms”
National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum; panelist for “Decolonizing Racial Categories
Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers; panelist for “Graphic Poetics: Approaching the Relationship between Comics and Poetry” for the paper “Obvious Invisibility: White Space as Visual Markers of Middle Eastern War Trauma in Persepolis and Look”
Critical Work
Poetry Editor; Sundog Lit • Editorial Resident; The Seventh Wave • Editorial Fellow; Frontier Poetry • Poetry Reader; Split Lip Magazine • Poetry Reader; Ruminate Magazine • Outreach Manager, The Speakeasy Project Online Workshops • Juror, National Scholastic Art & Writing Awards • Co-Founder, University of Michigan Salon Writing Workshop
Appointments
I’d love to connect.
Currently available for manuscript editing, artistic collaborations, and poetry readings. Will reopen editing services this summer.