Ellen Hagan  is a writer, performer, and educator. A regular contributer to Underwired Magazine, her latest poems can be found in the anthologies She Walks in Beauty (edited by Caroline Kennedy) and Bop, Strut & Dance (edited by Afaa Michael Weaver & Tara Betts). Her first collection of poetry, CROWNED was published by Sawyer House Press in 2010. Ellen’s performance work has been showcased at The New York International Fringe and The Los Angeles Women’s Theater Festival. Ellen has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and recieved national arts residencies at The Hopscotch House and The Louisiana ArtWorks. A proud Kentucky writer, she is a member of the Affrilachian Poets, Conjure Women, and is co-founder of the girlstory collective. She lives and works in New York City. Praise for CROWNED “Like a port town, Ellen Hagan's CROWNED is a landscape of intersections. & this landscape houses comings & goings, loss & desire, the infinite pleasures & breakings of the body. Every thing touches every thing as she moves us, deftly, from asphalt to bluegrass, from Facebook to Katrina, from bourbon to Latin church prayers found on the inside of her mother's shoe-box before surgery. She disallows us the comfort or disillusion of distance but, instead, works for a brave reckoning with the past & present. To me, these poems cousin the poems of both Audre Lorde & Kim Addonizio: sometimes they leave you splintered, sometimes they leave you saved. It's as if Hagan has lowered her stethoscope down into the matter of things & asked it to speak. These poems are what the stethoscope said.” -Aracelis Girmay, poet
writer. performer. educator.

Ellen Hagan

Ellen’s poems PS Education and PUBERTY in Capital Letters were selected for Caroline Kennedy’s latest poetry anthology She Walks in Beauty. Pick up a copy today!


Affrilachian Poets Reading -

July 1 - Ellen will perform with the Affrilachian Poets at Transylvania University. Follow Ellen on Twitter for details!


New Reading Added -

Come see Ellen read new work on September 29th at the University of Kentucky!


On Panel-

Ellen and fellow writer Renée Watson will be in Chicago to discuss creative writing at The National Council of Teachers of English. Check out Ellen’s tumblr for updates.

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