5×5 Reading + Open Mic
This event was held on Tuesday, September 2nd, at 7:00pm, at Moon Palace Books, featuring five fantastic readers: Sherrie Fernandez-Williams, Han, David Lawrence Grant, Oogie Push, and Kanoro Day.
Each featured artist took five minutes to share work; after the main reading, there was a short break for refreshments, followed by an open mic period. This reading, and the open mic afterward, were hosted by Davi Gray and Erin Sharkey. ASL interpretation was provided for both the main reading and the open mic.
Sherrie Fernandez-Williams (she/her) earned her MFA in Writing from Hamline University. She was a 2021-2023 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow and a 2021 Black Voices in Children’s Literature winner. Author of Goddess of the Whole Self and Soft: A Memoir. Fernandez-Williams has published in journals and anthologies including We Are Meant to Rise: Voices for Justice from Minneapolis to the World, How Dare We Write: A Multicultural Creative Writing Discourse, and The Poverty and Education Reader. She co-directs Queer Voices programming with LM Brimmer.
Han (he/him) is a justice-impacted artist, writer, and restorative justice practitioner whose work explores themes of healing, identity, and transformation. Through personal essays, he offers intimate reflections on lived experiences, resilience, and the intersections of justice and creativity. Drawing on both personal history and community practice, Han brings a trauma-informed and human-centered approach restorative justice, using storytelling as a tool for connection, accountability, and social change.
David Lawrence Grant (he/him) is a Minneapolis-based writer, teacher, and activist.
Current projects, besides the recently-published memoir, Rewind: Lessons from Fifty Years of Activism, co-written with long-time Minnesota activist T Williams, (MN Historical Society Press, April, 2025), include a feature film script about the rise and fall of VeeJay Records, with writer/producer Scott McLain.
Grant is a core alumnus member of The Playwrights’ Center, and a member of the Writers’ Guild of America/west. He teaches screenwriting at The Loft, FilmNorth, and MN Prison Writing Workshop.
Oogie_Push (she/her) is from the Meskwaki Nation currently creating on Dakota Territory, aka the Twin Cities. She is an actor, playwright, storyteller, poet, Meskwaki twine bag weaver, and cultural documentarian. Follow her current adventures on Instagram @oogie_push and you can see the content she creates on Youtube @oogie_push. She is currently a 2025 Native American Artist-in-Residence at the MN Historical Society focused on fiber hand-woven bags, and the Indigenous Initiatives Specialist at The Walker Art Center.
Kanoro Day (he/they) is a fat, black, trans, queer survivor from the Midwest with a degree from Hamline University where they studied psychology and creative writing. He focuses on writing works that protest oppression and encourage self adoration. They have represented the Twin Cities across many regional tournaments, including Rustbelt, the Individual World Poetry Slam, the Womxn of the World Poetry Slam, and most recently, The Midwest Poetry Mash Up. His work has accumulated over 124,000 views on Button Poetry’s YouTube channel, has been featured by Err Magazine, The Blacklist journal, TruArtSpeaks, and more.
Erin Sharkey (she/they) is a writer, arts and abolition organizer, cultural worker, and film producer based in Minneapolis. She is the editor of A Darker Wilderness: Black Nature Writing from Soil to Stars (Milkweed Editions ’23). Erin is a founding co-op member of the Fields at Rootsprings, a retreat and respite space in central MN, and co-founder, with Junauda Petrus, of an experimental arts collective called Free Black Dirt. She is the producer of film projects, including Small Business Revolution, which explored challenges and opportunities for Black-owned businesses in the Twin Cities in the summer of 2021. Sharkey has received fellowships and residencies from the Loft Mentor Series, VONA/Voices, the Givens Foundation, Penumbra Theatre, Coffee House Press, the Bell Museum of Natural History, Black Visions, Headwaters Foundation, and the Jerome Foundation. She has an MFA in creative writing from Hamline University and teaches with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop.
Davi Gray (she/they) is a queer, trans, nonbinary poet, writer, performer, artist, producer, activist, and abolitionist. They live in Minneapolis (Bde Óta Othúŋwe), within Mni Sóta Makoce, unceded lands of the Dakota and Ojibwe. Gray’s poetry collection This Body, This Fruit was a finalist for the 2025 Louise Bogan Award (Trio House Press), and her work has been published in Poetry, Water~Stone Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is a recipient of a 2025 Arts Experiences grant through the Minnesota State Arts Board and can often be found performing around the Twin Cities. You can learn more about her work, including upcoming events, at davigray.com.
Louise Waakaa’igan (she/her) is an enrolled member at Odaawaa-Zaaga’iganiing in northern Wisconsin. Her first chapbook, This Is Where (Aquarius Press), was published in 2020. She is also the first-place winner of the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop’s Broadside Competition (2016). Louise’s work has been previously published in PEN America, 21 Mythologies, The Moon Magazine, Night Colors, 27th Letter, Words in Gray Scale, and Doors Adjacent. She is ready to publish her second collection.
Better Things is a series of events sponsored by the ReEntry Lab, in partnership with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop (MPWW) and Moon Palace Books.
This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.
This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.
The ReEntry Lab is an organization working to connect writers and other artists leaving incarceration to a community that’s ready to receive them. You can learn more about its mission, volunteer to help, and sign up for the newsletter at reentrylab.org.
* 5×5 format inspired by the 555 Reads series, developed by Elizabeth R. Tannen.