Poet and activist Nikki Giovanni passes away at 81

Nikki Giovanni, an acclaimed poet and fierce activist, has passed away Monday at the age of 81. At her core, Giovanni wanted everyone to know being unapologetically Black allows all of us to be proud. Giovanni is the voice of Black strength.Yolanda Cornelia Giovanni was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, on June 7, 1943. According to her website, she grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. However, she and her sister would return to Knoxville each summer to visit their grandparents. Nikki graduated with honors in history from her grandfather’s alma mater, Fisk University.Giovanni would publish her first poetry collection, “Black Feeling Black Talk”, in 1968. Giovanni would go become a pillar of of the Black Arts and Civil Rights Movements. She would later write “Spin a Soft Black Song” (1971) and “Ego-Tripping and Other Poems for Young People” (1973), poems and books that spoke to the youth and their issues. Giovanni would later become a professor at Virginia Tech, where she taught from 1987 through 2022. She continued to write poetry. Giovanni received numerous awards, including the inaugural Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award, the American Book Award, the Langston Hughes Award, the Virginia Governor’s Award for the Arts, and the...