The Mourners Bench: And Other Stations of Weeping and Joy (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781938373107)

Billye Okera is a folk-performance poet. She was born in 1950, Washington D. C., and has been writing since the age of 17. Her work has appeared in Mynd Magazine and Dialogue, and she has performed locally at Cafe Myth.Com, The Lincoln Theater, The Potters House, Sankofa Books for Hale Gerima, The Black Family Reunion, Los Amigos, Barnes and Nobles, Market 5 Gallery, Mariposa, the 1997 Women Writers Conference at University of the District of Columbia for J. California Cooper, with Sonja Sanchez at the 7th Annual Martin Luther King Extravaganza in Washington, D. C., and with Nikki Giovanni at the Museum of African-American History in Norfolk, Virginia. Okera has performed nationally at Groove in NYC, and internationally at the Brixton Theater in London, England. She is a founding member of the Washington D. C. poetry troupe Collective Voices and performed fifteen years with them through the Washington Metropolitan area. In 2001, Okera was named a Nation's Capital Poet in Progress by Delores Kendrick, Poet Laureate of Washington, D. C. Her chosen name, Okera, is Yoruba for "In the likeness of God: Poetry is her ministry and she uses it to speak to women of the reality of their lives - full of heartache and pain, but also full of God inspired joy and celebration. Join her for this journey to "THE MOURNERS' BENCH and Other Stations of Weeping and Joy.".