Remica Bingham-Risher, a native of Phoenix, Arizona, is an alumna of Old Dominion University and Bennington College. She is a Cave Canem fellow and Affrilachian Poet. Among other journals, her work has been published in the New York Times, the Writer’s Chronicle, New Letters, Callaloo and Essence. She is the author of Conversion (Lotus, 2006) winner of the Naomi Long Madgett Poetry Award, What We Ask of Flesh (Etruscan, 2013) shortlisted for the Hurston/Wright Award and Starlight & Error (Diode, 2017) winner of the Diode Editions Book Award. Her first book of prose, Soul Culture: Black Poets, Books and Questions that Grew Me Up, was published by Beacon Press in 2022. Her next book of poems, Room Swept Home, was published by Wesleyan in February 2024. She is currently the Director of Quality Enhancement Plan Initiatives at Old Dominion University and resides in Norfolk, VA with her husband and children.

Learn more about Remica: remicabinghamrisher.com

Interview location: Norfolk, VA

Remica’s Books on the Bed:

If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin

Home by Toni Morrison

The Book of Light by Lucille Clifton

Joe Turner’s Come and Gone by August Wilson

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Fast Animal by Tim Seibles

Matt’s gifts for Remica:

To ‘Joy My Freedom by Tera Hunter

Somerset Homecoming by Dorothy Spruill Redford

Episode timeline:

0:00-3:33 — Intro

3:34-28:17 — Remica's family history, new book Room Swept Home, reading poems

28:18-42:10 — Matt presents gifts to Remica

42:11-1:38:59 — Remica's Books on the Bed