Darrel Alejandro Holnes

Darrel Alejandro Holnes (he/they) is an Afro-Panamanian American writer and multidisciplinary artist. He is the author of the poetry books Migrant Psalms (Northwestern University Press, 2021) and Stepmotherland (Notre Dame Press, 2022), which was nominated for the International Latino Book Awards’s Juan Felipe Herrera Poetry Prize. He is a recipient of the Andrés Montoya Poetry Prize from Letras Latinas, the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize, and a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship in creative writing for poetry. His poem “Praise Song for My Mutilated World" won the C. P. Cavafy Poetry Prize from Poetry International. 

Holnes’s plays have been produced in full or as readings at the Kennedy Center for the Arts American College Theater Festival (KCACTF), The Brick Theater, Kitchen Theater Company, Pregones/PRTT, Primary Stages, and others. He is a member of the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab, Civilians R&D Group, Page 73’s Interstate 73 Writers Workshop, and other groups. His play Starry Night was a finalist for the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Playwrights Conference and the Princess Grace Award in Playwriting. His play Bayano was also a finalist for the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Playwrights Conference. His most recent play, Black Feminist Video Game, was produced by The Civilians for 59E59, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Center Theatre Group, and won an inaugural Anthem Award presented by The Webby Awards. He is the founder of the Greater Good Commission and Festival, a festival of Latinx short plays.

Holnes has held residencies at MacDowell and Ucross, and has been awarded multiple fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Cave Canem, and Canto Mundo. His poetry has been published in English, Spanish, and French in various publications, including Poetry magazine, American Poetry Review, Callaloo, Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts, Pleiades, the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day series, La Estrella de Panamá, and others. His poetry has been featured in anthologies including When Language Broke Open: An Anthology of Queer and Trans Black Writers of Latin American Descent (University of Arizona Press, 2023) and Furious Flower: Seeding the Future of America (TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press, 2019).

Holnes also wrote the film Marimacha, which has been screened at over 14 festivals worldwide and made its New York premiere at the New York Latino Film Festival in 2023. Marimacha won Best Performances at the Latino Feedback Film Festival, Best of the Fest at Pride Film Fest, and Best LGBT Short from the Los Angeles Independent Women Film Awards.