B. Metzger Sampson

B. Metzger Sampson is a poet, essayist, and frequent collaborator with visual artists. They are the executive director of the Chicago Poetry Center, which hosts poetry residencies for thousands of Chicago School Students annually, public readings and workshops, and critical conversations. As a literary citizen of Chicago, B. is frequently named to Newcity’s “Lit 50: Who Really Books in Chicago,” and appears on the radio, podcasts, and in articles discussing poetry’s role in the broader world. As an arts leader, B. is focused on developing equity and transparency practices, including building greater pay equity across organizational roles, stipended roles for teaching artists on boards, and open and transparent board meetings. B. has taught students ages seven to 70 in universities, artist workshops, and teaching artist positions, is a frequent curriculum writer and speaker on arts education, and designed and executive produced the streaming educational poetry series Queen Zee’s Poetic Adventures, a free resource for all. They previously founded and edited Dear Navigator, an electronic experimental literary magazine for the School of the Art Institute of Chicago's MFA in Writing program. Publications include interviews, essays, and poems, in Adroit Journal, Temporary Art Review, Hypertext Magazine, and Poetry online. Their collaborative visual and written work has been shown at venues in and around Chicago, and in Neuss, Germany, and Cairo, Egypt.