Danez Smith (born in St. Paul, Minnesota) is a Black, queer, non-binary, HIV-positive poet and performer whose work inhabits the intersections of identity, illness, and survival with extraordinary emotional and sonic power. Their debut collection [insert] boy (YesYes Books, 2014) won the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. Their second collection, Don't Call Us Dead (Graywolf Press, 2017), was a finalist for the National Book Award and won the Forward Prize for Best Collection — making Smith the youngest ever recipient of that award. A founding member of the Dark Noise Collective, their work has appeared in Poetry and The New York Times.