Metta Sáma is author of the chapbooks the year we turned dragon (Portable Press @ Yo-Yo Labs), le animal and other creatures (Miel), After After/After "Sleeping to Dream (Nous-zōt Press) & Nocturne Trio (YesYes Books). Her first full- length collection, South of Here (New Issues Press), was published under her legal name, Lydia Melvin. She was co-winner of the 2016 Robert H. Winner Memorial Award from Poetry Society of America and a former Jay C. & Ruth Halls Poetry Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing. Her literary art, literary scholarship & book reviews have been published in various literary journals and anthologies. Sáma is the founder of Artists Against Police Brutality/ Cultures of Violence, a Senior Fellow of Black Earth Institute, and a member of the Advisory Board of Black Radish Books. She currently lives in NC with a little lion.