Tiny Room Poetry Series | Special Edition

Join us for an intimate evening of poetry and music featuring some of the Bay Area’s and LA’s premier artists. This special edition offers a rare chance to connect with poets and musicians up close, meet fellow lovers of the art, and experience a vibrant local space in a fresh new way.

Reserve your seat here!

With performances by Arlene Biala, Tureeda Mikell, Destiny Muhammad, and Dr. Donny Jackson, the night also celebrates the release of Tshaka Campbell’s newest collection, BLOOD AT THE ROOT”: An nkisi (El Martillo Press). The book is a lyrical meditation on fatherhood, ancestry, and identity—blending memory and history to confront trauma and resilience while affirming love as the force that carries us forward.

🎥 Watch the deep dive podcast: Blood at the Root Discussion

Tiny Room Poetry Series features an inspiring lineup:

Arlene Biala

POET, AUTHOR, PERFORMANCE ARTIST, COMMUNITY ORGANIZER
Arlene Biala is a Filipina American writer from the San Francisco Bay Area who has been participating in poetry performances and workshops for over 30 years. She is a 2023-2026 Lucas Artist Residency Fellow in Literary Arts at the Montalvo Arts Center and was Poet Laureate of Santa Clara County for 2016 and 2017. She is the author of continental drift, one inch punch, and her beckoning hands, which won the 2015 American Book Award. Her latest book, a thousand voices whispering, is forthcoming from Sampaguita Press in November 2025.

Tureeda ‘Ture Ade’ Mikell

Tureeda 'Ture Ade' Mikell is a UCB Bay Area Writing Project Fellow 1996, an award winning poet, Black Panther Party Alum, she has either performed, or her work has traveled to South Africa, to Egypt, UK, China, Turkey, Mexico, and Switzerland.

Mikell served or has read as Poet in Residence at the Museum of the African Diaspora, Oakland Museum, Randall Museum, San Jose Museum of Art Invitational, DeYoung Museum, and Goldengate Academy of Sciences.  Anthologized in Poetry is Bread, (2025 Nirala Publications, India, Tina Cane, Editor) Mikell is author of Synchronicity: The Oracle of Sun Medicine (2020, Nomadic Press) nominated for the California Book Award, and The Body: Oracle of Memory (2024, Black Lawrence Press, NY.)

Mikell received Berkeley Poetry Festival's 2024 LifeTime Achievement Award, as a story medicine woman, nature’s child, an activist for holism hell bent on asserting life. Mikell can be found on, LinkIn, Instagram, or tureedamikell.com

Destiny Muhammad

Destiny Muhammad is a Recording/Performing Artist | Band Leader |Composer & Producer. Her genre is cool and eclectic with a feel of Jazz & Storytelling to round out thesonic experience. Destiny collaborations, curations and commissioning include: Grace Cathedral Christmas Concert Series Stanford Jazz Festival featured Artist, Santa Cruz Symphony Recital Series, a San Jose Jazz Fest JazzAid Commissioned Artist, Guest/ Collaborator with Composer Marcus Shelby for Zaccho Dance ‘The Peoples Palace’ and featured on KQED Podcast & Sunday Music Drop

Destiny is an Elected Governor of the The Recording Academy, San Francisco Chapter, SFJAZZ, Teaching Artist, ASCAP, Songwriter Awardee, Chamber Music America/ Doris Duke

Foundation Performance Plus Awardee and California Arts Council Legacy Fellow

Dr Donny Jackson

Dr. Donny Jackson 

A staple of the poetry community, Donny Jackson also holds a doctorate in clinical psychology, and is a director and multiple Emmy-winning documentary television producer. As a spoken word artist, Donny has performed and featured throughout North America, including at the legendary Nuyorican Poets Café, and venues in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, California, and Toronto. Donny has released four poetry albums: boy, girl, he / him, and fatherly. His debut volume of poetry, boy, was published by Silver Star Laboratory in February 2020, and his most recent book, toward the sun: love haiku, was released in February 2024.

Blood at the Root cover

Tshaka Campbell is the first black, Santa Clara County Poet Laureate and has authored four books of poetry entitled “TARMAN”, “MUTED WHISPERS”, “STUFF, I will write more”, “TUNNEL VISION'' and is latest book published by El Martilo press entitled “BLOOD AT THE ROOT. ” His words have been featured in Bridges Review, BBC UK, Content magazine, Speakeasy vol 1, Liminal Animals, Rigorous magazine, among others. A city of Milpitas and city of Sunnyvale commendation in the arts award recipient, Tshaka has also collaborated on projects with the World Health Organization (WHO), the De young museum in San Francisco, the NUMU and Triton museums, as well sits on the Board of Directors for Silicon Valley Creates arts council and Poetry Center San Jose. He has partnered with the Silicon Valley Transit Authority and community members to deliver youth programs centered around expanding poetry and literature. He has 4 spoken word albums entitled "ONE", “BLOODLINES”, "SKIN vol.1"; and his most recent release "NKISI" is currently available on all streaming platforms.

Beautiful Black Books invites you to the Tiny Room Poetry Series, a special event celebrating the power of poetry and music hosted by Tshaka Campbell. Join us for an intimate evening featuring some of the most celebrated East and West Coast artists.

Sunday, June 29th, doors at 6:00pm, show 6:30pm - 9:00pm

SJZ Breakroom
310 South 1st Street San Jose, CA 95113

Reserve your spot now for an evening that will uplift, inspire, and stay with you long after the last word is spoken. Tickets on sale now.

An inspiring lineup featuring:

Rudy Francisco is one of the most recognizable names in Spoken Word Poetry. Rudy Francisco has shared stages with prominent artists such as Gladys Knight, Jordin Sparks, Musiq Soul Child, and Jill Scott. Ultimately, Rudy's goal is to continue to assist others in harnessing their creativity while cultivating his own. Rudy Francisco is the author of Excuse Me As I Kiss The Sky (2024), I'll Fly Away (2020) and Helium (2024). He is also an Individual World Poetry Slam Champion, a National Poetry Slam Champion and has appeared on NBC’s “The Tonight Show” starring Jimmy Fallon and “The Bachelorette”.

Carlos Andrés Gómez is a Colombian American poet, actor, and speaker from New York City. He is the author of the poetry collection Fractures (University of Wisconsin Press, 2020), selected by Pulitzer Prize winner and 19th U.S. Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey as the winner of the 2020 Felix Pollak Prize in Poetry, and the memoir Man Up: Reimagining Modern Manhood (Penguin Random House, 2012). Winner of the Foreword INDIES Gold Medal and the International Book Award, Gómez has been published in The Nation, New England Review, Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series, The Yale Review, Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World (W.W. Norton & Co., 2022), and elsewhere. A star of HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, TV One’s Verses and Flow, and Spike Lee’s #1 box office movie Inside Man with Denzel Washington, Carlos partnered with John Legend on Senior Orientation, a program to counteract bullying and champion inclusive masculinity among high school students. He has delivered keynotes and recited his original work at more than 1,500 colleges, universities, independent schools, and companies in 47 U.S. states and 28 countries across six continents. Carlos is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. For more, please visit: www.CarlosLive.com

Derrick Sanderlin is a musician, writer and organizer who lives, works and loves in the city of San Jose. They grew up in a diversity of sound, singing in convalescent homes, churches, and performing with local punk rock and metal bands. Derrick’s first EP Ghetto blends jazz, punk, folk, and R&B to communicate the complexity of family, love life, and identity as a young black kid in a dominant and oppressive culture. Derrick went on to open up sounds and conversations around toxic masculinity, mental health, the power of story, and the art of resilience through their project Sine Wave, a band borne out of an artist residency. While Derrick is not a native, he has experienced a deep love for San Jose, collaborating with local artists such as former poet laureate Mighty Mike McGee, singer/songwriter Noñameko, and rapper Latoya Fernandez.

Destiny Muhammad is a Recording/Performing Artist | Band Leader |Composer & Producer. Her genre is cool and eclectic with a feel of Jazz & Storytelling to round out thesonic experience. Destiny collaborations, curations and commissioning include: Grace Cathedral Christmas Concert Series Stanford Jazz Festival featured Artist, Santa Cruz Symphony Recital Series, a San Jose Jazz Fest JazzAid Commissioned Artist, Guest/ Collaborator with Composer Marcus Shelby for Zaccho Dance ‘The Peoples Palace’ and featured on KQED Podcast & Sunday Music Drop. Destiny is an Elected Governor of the The Recording Academy, San Francisco Chapter, SFJAZZ, Teaching Artist, ASCAP, Songwriter Awardee, Chamber Music America/ Doris Duke Foundation Performance Plus Awardee and California Arts Council Legacy Fellow.