Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, and a PhD candidate in the Theatre Arts and Performance Studies program at Brown University. She is the author of the award-winning children’s book Layla’s Happiness(Enchanted Lion Books), and the poetry collections Strut (Agape Editions) and Karma’s Footsteps (Flipped Eye). Tallie’s Dear Continuum: Letters to a Poet Crafting Liberation (Grand Concourse Press) gathers her advice to writers dedicated to social justice in epistolary form and was named a “Spectacular Book of 2015” by Split This Rock. Her newest book, We Go Slow (August 2025), is a contemplative picture book celebrating the everyday wonder of slowing down and appreciating our surroundings.
Tallie’s poetry is the subject of the film “I Leave My Colors Everywhere.” She is also featured in “Tell Me Another Story,” a film produced by the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation about the importance of inclusivity in children’s literature.
Tallie is the mother of three galaxies who look like daughters.
