REFLECTION & REASON

It was a term used by many of us: "2020 Vision." We were excited for the new year, with New Years' Resolutions ready for execution, and a clear perspective for activities on a global scale. Visions for upliftment, success, love, and awareness with an undercurrent of positivity. These messages were clear, because 2019 had been a year of extreme learning, self-reflection, and healing. A worldwide pandemic causing a global lockdown, international protesting against police brutality and the lynching of African people, and the continuous fight for racial equality with Black lives mattering: these predictions were far from the vision we had planned for. It wasn't anything we had prepared for, but 2020 became a vision that would open our eyes clearly. History had been broken. Conditions that we had never experienced before, were now realities the human race was forced to face. This fog was removed from our collective eyes, only for us to realize that there is a need fo...

REFLECTIONS – AN INTRODUCTION  When I first heard that Kya Publishing was partnering with members of the Black Arts community to present stories and reflections on the times and the surrounding social environment, I was excited. I knew that as an artist, I wanted to be part of a platform that offered positive movements and social change with literature at the forefront of the discussion. We’re living in unprecedented times: with countless stories of undocumented injustices to unusually high numbers of COVID-19 cases affecting our communities, there is a lot to face. These two factors have provided the necessary push to take chances in an effort to make sense of it all. I am fortunate that I am one of the lucky ones because I have the tools to help me disseminate, summarize and reinterpret. And yet, I am facing a difficult task in that not all of these tools can convey the effects of this experience on myself and those close to me.  I have come to the conclusion t...

Kya Publishing was initially established to support the books I (Stacey Marie Robinson) have written and to provide an outlet for me to share these works with others, with the hopes of seeing Kya Publishing  develop into a natural home for other urban Canadian writers who have not yet established a place within the current Canadian literary market. I am a writer, and have been an “aspiring author” since adolescence. I had the ideas, the passion, and the determination, but was not always presented with an opportunity. The Toronto Urban Book Expo (TUBE) is my way of giving an opportunity to writers like myself, and including myself, so that we have a consistent venue to display our work, and share our art and voice with the greater society. The importance of being a supporting voice in the Canadian urban literary and cultural community was reinforced for me when I was invited to attend a Toronto Public Library event in celebration of Black-Canadian writers in February of 2010....