Luther “Lue” Hughes (she/her) is the author of A Shiver in the Leaves (BOA Editions, 2022), listed as best books of 2022 in The New Yorker , and the chapbook, Touched (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2018), recommended by the American Library Association. She is the founder of Shade Literary Arts, an online platform for queer writers of color, cohosts The Poet Salon Podcast with Gabrielle Bates and Dujie Tahat, and serves as the Poetry Editor for CHUM News . Her honors include the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Rosenberg Fellowship, the 92Y Discovery Poetry Prize, Cascade PBS’s Black Arts Legacies honoree, and named Most Influential by Seattle Magazine . Her writing has been published in The Paris Review , Orion , American Poetry Review , Seattle Met , and others. She’s been featured in The Seattle Times , ForbesWomen , Essence , KUOW Public Radio , and more. Lue lives in Seattle, where she was born and raised.

FICTION: "The Distance Between Sunrise and Sunset," Wildness

INTERVIEW: “Exploring the Black Erotic: An Interview with Luther Hughes on A Shiver in the Leaves,” Honey Literary

INTERVIEW: "Luther Hughes with Tony Leuzzi," Brooklyn Rail

REVIEW: "When the Years are Gone: On Playlist for the Apocalypse by Rita Dove," Poetry Northwest

ESSAY: "On Vulnerability,” Hayden's Ferry Review

Depression, restlessness, and interiority

Trauma, memory, and violences against the body

Love is possibly one of the most popularized subjects that brings people to poetry. There is nothing better than reading a poem that excites the heart or that reveals something in us we thought laid dormant. How do we write a love poem? What does it mean to approach love in our writing without risking corniness? In this two-hour, generative in-person workshop, we’ll discuss and analyze poems by Donika Kelly, Ada Limón, and Aracelis Girmay, among others, and we’ll write poems in response to prompts that will motivate us to think about love and love poems differently. The goal of this workshop is to examine and challenge our ideas on what makes up a love poem.

There are moments in our lives that shape who we are today. Sometimes it’s difficult to accurately tell this story. Our history is a part of us and at the same time, it haunts us, reminds us of those times when we were at our lowest. There are also moments in our lives that elevate us and lift us up, times that we were the happiest. In this workshop, we will read and discuss work by Vievee Francis, Li-Young Lee, Safia Elhillo, and others. With exercises and prompts, you will learn ways to take control of our stories.

During Winter, Spring, and Fall - Prioritizing queer writers and writers of color

Please contact us through Luther’s website or our inquiry form