Conference Themes, Through the Eyes of a Poet
ACUI Talks: Mahogany L. Browne
Mahogany L. Browne came to ACUI Talks to share her poetry, to reflect on themes important to ACUI members, and to do some name-dropping. Audre Lorde. June Jordan. Gwendolyn Brooks. Lucille Clifton. Miriam Alves. Sonia Sanchez.
These were just some of the preeminent Black female poets and writers that Browne, poet-in-residence at the Lincoln Center, wanted to share with her audience and inform on how their work, and hers, were in synch with the themes of ACUI’s 2025 conference. “I evoke these poets as elders, as teachers. To quote them is to make sure the world never forgets.”
Having connected with ACUI’s Conference Program Team members, Browne was well-versed on this day to connect her written words, and those of her peers, to the ACUI themes of resilience, innovation, connections, service, justice, togetherness, big ideas, and rebuilding.
“Resilience is not just surviving; it is shaping the storm into something new.”
“Innovation is born of necessity, the child of the urgent now. It hums in the marrow of the dreamers,
the ones who sketch blueprints on napkins.”
“Big ideas bloom in the cracks of the old world. They ask what if, and why not? The push against the edges of fear,daring to shape a different sky.”
“Big ideas mean nothing without connection, without the ‘we,’ the collective push, the us,the collective pulse of hands reaching for one another.”
“Service is commitment to the whole; it is not charity, but an offering.”
“Rebuilding is an act of faith, to believe in the broken and begin again. The people returning to the wreckage after the storm.”
