Current Dallas Poet Laureate

Mag Gabbert named the second Dallas Poet Laureate

Naisha Randhar awarded Youth Poet Laureate title

(Dallas) – Mayor Eric Johnson named Dr. Mag Gabbert the city’s second Poet Laureate in a special ceremony Wednesday morning at Dallas City Hall. Naisha Randhar, a student at The Hockaday School, was named Youth Poet Laureate.

Over a two-year term, Gabbert will represent the City of Dallas as an ambassador of the literary arts by presenting her original poems at schools and community events. She will develop outreach initiatives to engage and inspire the Dallas community to read, write, perform and appreciate the written and spoken word. Gabbert will hold regular artist-in-residence office hours at the Central Library.

A Dallas native and graduate of the Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Gabbert is the author of a full-length book of poetry, SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS, published last year and winner of the 2021 Charles B. Wheeler Prize in Poetry. She is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize, a Discovery Award from the Unterberg Poetry Center and fellowships from the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, Idyllwild Arts and Poetry at Round Top. Her work has been published in The American Poetry Review, The Paris Review Daily and more than 50 other magazines and journals.

Currently a clinical assistant professor at SMU, Gabbert has an MFA from University of California Riverside and a PhD in English from Texas Tech.

Poetry by Dr. Mag Gabbert

[These poems in accordion]

Poem for My City

Confession: I did exactly the kind of woo-woo thing people assume artists do when the time came to write you this poem: I asked the universe to send me one. But, by Monday evening, stumbling through those last files in the back of my mind, I thought the universe had refused. Once again, I’d forgotten the work of a poet: to pay attention, to notice. Truth is, I’d already shared a patch of grass with a child who yanked silver eclipse glasses from his face and said yes, he’d seen it: as window in the sky. I’d looked at the photo my friend took before her plane landed—your grid bright and small as a microchip. I had even driven past, if not a terrific new moon, then a yellow kite caught in a tree branch. A lit stadium dome on the horizon. And you’d given me all of this.

Written for the Poet Laureate announcement 4/10/2024

An Aria

The Rules of Poetry

If you would like to request office hours, program or event participation from the Poet Laureate and/or Youth Poet Laureate, please fill out the following request form:

Poet Laureate Request Form

Dallas Public Library, the Office of Arts & Culture and Deep Vellum launched the Dallas poet laureate program in June 2021 to recognize exemplary poetry and the poet’s role in sharing poetry with the greater community. The program is funded by the Friends of Dallas Public Library, Inc, the Joe M. and Doris R. Dealey Family Foundation, Office of Arts & Culture and Deep Vellum.