Dralandra Larkins is a multi-genre writer, three-time award-winning spoken word poet, and the author of "Before I Lie" (2025). A teaching artist with COMPAS and art instructor at Now Make Art, her work blends rhythm, intimacy, and vulnerability to create a haven for healing and advocacy--rooted deeply in her background as a social worker. She writes at the crossroads of memory and resistance, exploring the medicinal power of language and the possibilities of Afrofuturist imagination.
She is a recipient of the Loft Literary Center's Teaching Artist Fellowship, the Minnesota State Arts Board Creative Individuals Grant, the EPIC Grant, and a Minnesota Regional Arts Council Grant. Her work has been featured in Minnesota Women's Press, Tupelo Press, Insight News, The Edge Magazine, and several anthologies. Dralandra has performed for the NAACP, Button Poetry, Mill City Museum, the Minnesota State Capitol, the Black Business Ball, the Minnesota Black Authors Expo, and more.
She has led healing-based writing workshops across Minnesota for organizations such as The Loft Literary Center, Perpich Center for Arts Education, Nexus Community Partners, The Bridge for Youth, Hennepin County, the St. Cloud School District, and the University of Minnesota's Urban Research and Outreach-Engagement Center (UROC). She also serves as a grant evaluator for the Minnesota State Arts Board and Youthprise and has judged numerous Minnesota Book Awards. Dralandra is the creator of the Pocket Poetry Dispenser at Next Chapter Booksellers in St. Paul, bringing poems to the public--one push at a time.
She is co-editor of "Rewilding Hope," "The Nations Underground: Writing With Our Ancestors," and "The Lost Lake Folk Opera (Vol. 10)." She currently serves as program assistant for Friends of the St. Paul Public Library, where she coordinates author events for Club Book, Moving Words, and the Fireside Reading Series.