A Métis Poet’s Kitchen Party

On Sunday, January 8 at 6pm, join Massy Arts Society, Massy Books and author Jónína Kirton for A Métis Poet’s Kitchen Party—a boisterous evening of celebratory storytelling. Featuring a talented line up of Métis poets including: Délani Valin, Michelle Poirier Brown, Isabelle Hébert and Jónína Kirton.

This project has been made possible by the Government of Canada. Ce projet a été rendu possible grâce au gouvernement du Canada.

Venue & Accessibility

The event will be hosted at the Massy Arts Gallery, at 23 East Pender Street in Chinatown, Vancouver.

Registration is free, open to all and required for entrance. The gallery is wheelchair accessible and a gender-neutral washroom is on-site. Please refrain from wearing scents or heavy perfumes.

For more on accessibility including parking, seating, venue measurements and floor plan, and how to request ASL interpretation please visit: massyarts.com/accessibility

Covid Protocols: Masks keep our community safe and are mandatory (N95 masks are recommended as they offer the best protection). We ask if you are showing symptoms, that you stay home. Thank you kindly.

With Readers

Délani Valin is neurodivergent and Métis with Nehiyaw, Saulteaux, French-Canadian and Czech ancestry. She studies for her master’s in professional communications at Royal Roads University, and has a Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing from Vancouver Island University. Her poetry has been awarded The Malahat Review’s Long Poem Prize and subTerrain’s Lush Triumphant Award. Her work has appeared in PRISM International, Adbusters, Room, and in the anthologies Those Who Make Us and Bawaajigan. She is on the editorial board of Room and The Malahat Review, and lives on traditional and unceded Snuneymuxw territory (Nanaimo, BC).

Michelle Poirier Brown is an internationally published poet and performer living on unceded syilx territory in Vernon, BC. She is nêhiyaw-iskwêw and a citizen of the Métis Nation. You Might Be Sorry You Read This was published in March 2022 by the University of Alberta Press and her chapbook Intimacies was published in October 2022 by Jack Pine Press. Her poem “Wake” won PRISM international’s 2019 Earle Birney Prize. The song cycle, “The Length of a Day” (Jeffrey Ryan, composer), premiered in 2021. Michelle’s work has appeared in Arc, CV2, The Greensboro Review, Grain, Vallum, and several anthologies.

Isabelle Hébert is a disabled, Two-Spirit, Métis, multidisciplinary artist and counsellor. They were raised on the unceded territories of the Mi’kma’ki and Wolastoqiyik. Their paternal heritage comes from both those peoples, Red River Métis and the Brayonne/Acadiene settlers in what is known as Edmundston, New Brunswick. Their maternal heritage comes from the Middle East and all over the Mediterranean parts of Europe. They currently reside in the unceded territories of the Kwikwetlem and Katzie peoples in what is known as Port Moody, British Columbia.

Jónína Kirton,an Icelandic and Red River Métis poet was born in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba, the traditional lands of the Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, Anishinaabeg and the Métis. She was sixty-one when she received the 2016 Vancouver’s Mayor’s Arts Award for an Emerging Artist in the Literary Arts category. Her second collection of poetry, An Honest Woman, was a finalist in the 2018 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize. Her third book, Standing in a River of Time, was released in 2022. She is a citizen of the Métis Nation of BC and currently lives in New Westminster BC, the unceded territory of the Halkomelem speaking peoples.