Elisha “Mother” Minter is a storyteller and drummer that delights audiences with beautiful African tales. “The most enjoyable part about sharing stories for me is seeing the faces of those who will listen,” Minter told the Salisbury Post. “It is most gratifying to spark a memory that we can all share and to see the smiles and even concern when some of my characters get into a little trouble. I love the laughter and the warm hugs after the session has ended.” She was a Road Scholar with the North Carolina Humanities Council and holds a B.A. from University of North Carolina at Charlotte in African and African-American studies.

Junious ‘Jay’ Ward is a poet and teaching artist from Charlotte, NC. He is a National Slam champion (2018), an Individual World Poetry Slam champion (2019), and the author of Sing Me A Lesser Wound (Bull City Press, 2020) and Composition (forthcoming from Button Poetry, 2022). Jay currently serves as a Program Director for BreatheInk, where he facilitates writing and performance workshops and coaches youth poets attending Brave New Voices each year. He serves as vice-chair for the board of The Watering Hole, a non-profit organization that aims to nurture writers of color in the Southern tradition. He also serves on several curatorial committees related to the arts in Charlotte. He has attended Breadloaf Writer’s Conference, Callaloo, The Watering Hole and Tin House Winter Workshop. His work can be found in Crabfat Magazine, Lackadaisy Lit Mag, Four Way Review, Diode Poetry Journal, and on Button Poetry.