Ali Black knew early on she wanted poetry and writing to be a big part of her life.
“I noticed that I was constantly writing things down: poems, the lyrics of R&B songs to memorize them, and notes to my classmates,” she recalls. “I loved it. I realized writing cleared my head, improved my memory and provided me with an emotional release. I knew I wanted to do it forever.”
By high school, Ali had already decided that she planned to attend college to study English, language and literature with a concentration in poetry. She enjoyed sports and performed well in soccer, basketball and track at Euclid High School.
“There weren’t many outlets for creative writers, but everyone at school knew I liked sports and that I loved to write,” Ali says.
During high school, two of her poems were published in The Plain Dealer’s “Next” section. “Getting published early made me think, ‘Oh, maybe I am good at this,’” Ali remembers of the early confidence-boosting experience.
She went on to more than fulfill her goal of attending college by earning a dual Bachelor of Arts in English, language and literature and Communication. She also earned her Master of Arts degree in English from The University of Toledo. In 2022, she completed her Master of Fine Arts degree in Poetry from Cleveland State University through the Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts program.
Ali is the author of the poetry collection We Look Better Alive (Burnside Review Press, 2025) and the poetry chapbook If It Heals At All (Jacar Press, 2020). The chapbook was selected by Jaki Shelton Green for the New Voices Series and named a finalist for the 2021 Ohioana Book Award in poetry.
“When I hold my books, see them, sell them and read from them, they do give me a sense of, I have accomplished something that I’ve always dreamed of,” Ali says. “But I would have kept writing anyway. I don’t need to be published to continue my journey as a writer. It’s nice because it helps the work reach a broader audience, but it isn’t the reason I write.”
Ali’s writing has also appeared in The Atticus Review, jubilat, Literary Hub, The Offing, The Adroit Journal and elsewhere. She was the recipient of the Academy of American Poets University & College Poetry Prize for her poem “Kinsman.”
“The poems that Ali crafts have this incredible, luminous directness and seem to be distilled out of experience,” observes Hilary Plum, associate professor, NEOMFA Fiction & Creative Nonfiction, and associate director and editor, CSU Poetry Center, Cleveland State University. “She’s very interested in conversational modes that women and girls use to talk to each other. She has an astonishing ability to create something that’s really moving and powerful, yet it looks simple like she just did it magically.”
For the past three years, Ali has worked at Hathaway Brown School, where she is the Program Director of The Aspire Program, an academic and leadership development initiative for Middle School girls. Aspire also offers high school and college students an introduction to teaching. Additionally, with her husband Donald Black, Jr., Ali cofounded Balance Point Studios, a nonprofit organization dedicated to making, teaching, and sharing art with teens and young adults.
Locally, she has taught and performed her poetry at Playhouse Square, MOCA Cleveland, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Cleveland Public Library, B Side Lounge, the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Detention Center, and numerous schools throughout Northeast Ohio.
Currently, Ali has completed a few poems that she feels could provide the foundation for a new collection of poetry. Since 2022, she’s also been drafting a young adult novel.
She is also working on a collection of essays and she’s thinking about using part of her $10,000 Cleveland Arts Prize to work with a nonfiction editor or writer to help arrange the collection and help her get it ready for publication.
Regarding winning her Cleveland Arts Prize, Ali says: “The thing that gives me chills and I’m most honored about is being a part of the lineage of all these women I respect and admire. Just to be a name on the same list as Toni Morrison and Rita Dove, that feels good.”
You can follow Ali’s work on Instagram @aliblack_poet or her website ablackpoet.com.
When she’s writing a new poem, she says, her process involves a lot of writing in her home office or at the dining room table and her Akita named Kodie usually gets comfortable next to her, a signal that they’re going to be in that chair for a while. As a warm-up, she often reads other great poet’s work for inspiration.