To celebrate the arrival of The Robert Poems by S. Yarberry, a speculative trans history project that reimagines a trans life for William Blake's younger brother, Robert, S. and a band of trans poets from across Chicago will perform their work, staging an intimate and strange conversation on speculation and the trans literary archive. This is a night to gather with and for trans people aiming to ignite the critical role imagination plays in our poetry and, indeed, history. But wait! Before the night ends, stay a moment, everyone is welcome to revel a bit with something sweet, something sparkling.
A speculative poetic history reimagining Robert Blake, the brother of the celebrated poet William Blake, as a trans man in the eighteenth century.
Blending deeply researched historical details with the author’s personal experiences, The Robert Poems playfully and critically imagines a trans literary archive during a period in which transness, as we know it today, is not always readily visible. Robert Blake was a ghostly figure that often visited his brother, William, after Robert’s untimely death at the age of twenty-five—the same age S. Yarberry was when they began their medical transition. This happenstance of transitions, medical and metaphysical, drove Yarberry through a series of poetic explorations culminating in a collection with one question beating at its heart: what if trans history could be built on abundance, rather than scarcity?
For fans of Jordy Rosenberg’s Confessions of the Fox and Ruth Padel’s Darwin, The Robert Poems provides a lush landscape for Robert to thrive within, offering a new wellspring for trans pasts and a springboard from which to imagine inventive, expansive trans futures.
S. Yarberry (he/they) is a trans poet and scholar. Their poems have appeared in AGNI, Guernica, Gulf Coast, and Indiana Review, among many others. His first book, A Boy in the City, (Deep Vellum, 2022), was the winner of the Foreword INDIES Prize in Poetry. S. is currently a PhD Candidate in English at Northwestern University where he studies William Blake. Based in Chicago, S. runs the literary magazine Tyger Quarterly and hosts the monthly PO Box Poetry reading series.