C Sebastian Grace

C Sebastian Grace is a genderqueer writer and spoken word artist; they are also a self-proclaimed “quintuple Leo [and] a closet punk-ska rocker.” They were born and raised in Miami, Florida and made their way to the Pacific Northwest, where they settled in Seattle, Washington. They were in their third year of medical school when they first attended an annual showcase for the BENT Writing Institute, the only queer writing institute in the country at the time, and were entranced by the succession of queer voices stepping up to the microphone. They saw that slam poetry could be a space for exploring and honoring the self before a supportive community, and knew they wanted in. Grace began writing and performing with BENT, and by 2014, they were a part of the Seattle Poetry Slam team. They moved to Brooklyn, New York, to pursue a Master of Fine Arts in writing and social activism at the Pratt Institute, graduating in 2016. They went on to earn a Brooklyn Poets Fellowship in 2017. A tireless activist in the Brooklyn poetry community, Grace ran Union Square Slam, a spoken word performance space in downtown New York City, and helped coordinate the Women of the World Poetry Slam when the annual competition came to Brooklyn. Grace was also named the Vox Pop Individual Slam champion in 2016. They released their debut chapbook, 296, with Next Left Press in 2015. Named for the DSM diagnostic code for bipolar disorder, Grace’s book combines poetry with prose essays to portray the poet’s life with mental illness with intense intimacy, calling for a reckoning against the harrowing systemic stigmatization they encountered. Grace is currently working on a novel-length poetic memoir, and they have made their way back to the beaches of their South Florida home.