[Reading] Ariana Reines

We are delighted to welcome Ariana Reines — the poet and artist ‘who honors her traditions by being like no one else’*. We first hosted Ariana back on October 28, 2023, and that address in Brussels – where her grandparents met as refugees at the end of World War II, and where she was one of our first guests to speak about the disaster that was unfolding since October 7 – ended up partly initiating her book Wave of Blood, which was published by the Brussels publisher Divided a year later, in October 2024. 

Wave of Blood wrestles with the mind of war, and is at times shocking in its self-analysis. Written in the aftermath of her mother’s suicide, it is a furious and sincere essay, an eclipse notebook, a family chronicle, all told in the poetry of witness. 

Ariana will revisit the book and the reading she did at rile* almost three years ago, which is transcribed in it, as well as reading new work for us. Eleanor Ivory Weber from Divided Publishing will introduce the reading. After Ariana’s reading there will be space for a conversation with the audience.

Schedule

19:00 Introduction by Divided Publishing
19:10 Reading by Ariana Reines

About

Ariana Reines is an award-winning poet, Obie-winning playwright, performing artist, and translator. Her most recent books are The Rose (Graywolf, 2025), which Chris Kraus called “thrilling and harrowing,” and Wave of Blood (Divided Publishing, 2024), which Raymond Antrobus called “Brave. Brilliant. Bold. A wave and a wail of a book.” Her other books include A Sand Book (Tin House, 2019), The Cow (Alberta Prize, 2006), Coeur De Lion (2007), and Mercury (2011), both from Fence Books, and The Origin of the World (Semiotext(e), 2014). Her poetry, essays, and interviews have appeared in Artforum, Art in America, The Believer, The Boston Review, Bomb, Granta, Harper’s, The Los Angeles Review of Books, POETRY, and more. In 2022, Reines served as the Distinguished Poet-in-Residence at Wichita State University and the Mary Routt Chair of Writing at Scripps College in Claremont, California.

* Ben Lerner