Winter Freeing Refrains: Feb 15 & Mar 24, 2022

We excited to announce the dates of the next two Freeing Refrains gatherings and our first guest storyteller!  

Freeing Refrains resumes on Tuesday, February 15, 2022 at 6:30 p.m. with Conie B sharing more stories from their rural-urban mixed Asian perspective.  RSVP here.  

On Thursday, March 24, 2022, we welcome Merle Geode to share stories from their mixed Asian life.  Mark your calendars and RSVP here!

Bio:  Merle Geode is a mixed race (Korean and white) disabled genderfluid poet/writer, shamanic practitioner, and multidisciplinary artist based in Minneapolis living with metastatic breast cancer. They have a B.S. degree in Zoology from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where they were a UW-Madison Writing Fellow. They were a food and features writer for several years for Isthmus and Our Lives Magazine in Madison, but their storytelling is now taking a turn for more experimental and expansive forms. They are currently an MFA candidate in Poetry at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities and a mentor in the Write Like Us program for BIPOC writers across five local community colleges. Their poems and essays appear in Love, Always: Partners of Trans People on Intimacy, Challenge and Resilience; MNArtists; and poetry.onl. Currently, they are working on a picture book about anticipatory grief and death as an author/illustrator.

They are a former journalist, fine dining cook, and dog groomer who has discovered, during the pandemic, that they actually like to garden.

Socials:  
https://mnartists.walkerart.org/ones-a-crowd
https://www.poetry.onl/read/merle-geo
https://merlegeode.com/
IG: @merlegeode

Freeing Refrains is a prototype storytelling space imagined for Biracial & Rural (BnR), a community of care and storytelling space. In 2022 Freeing Refrains is experimenting with guest storytellers to complexify our reflections on what is restricting and empowering.

The current BnR dream is to come together in arts based retreats over the summer and continue the connection virtually over the winter. Retreats culminate with participants sharing their story at an Open Mic event to foster community dialogue. Read more at http://www.pointsoflightmusic.net/p/biracial-rural.html.