The Brooklyn Rail

Akilah Oliver (1961–2011) was born in St. Louis and grew up in Los Angeles. She was the author of two books of poetry: A Toast in the House of Friends (2009) and the she said dialogues: flesh memory (1999), which received a PEN Beyond Margins award. Her chapbooks include A Collection of Objects (2010), a(A)ugust (2007), The Putterer’s Notebook (2006) and An Arriving Guard of Angels, Thusly Coming to Greet (2004). Oliver was an influential teacher and a notable performer. She collaborated with a range of artists and musicians and co-founded the experimental, feminist performance collective Sacred Naked Nature Girls in 1994. She was also a member of the Belladonna* feminist avant-garde collaborative and a graduate student in Philosophy, Art and Social Thought at the European Graduate School. Oliver lived for many years in Boulder, Colorado and taught at the Naropa Institute’s Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics. In addition, she taught at Pratt Institute and at The New School in New York City, where she lived at the time of her death.