Mona Lisa Saloy

Portrait by Romero & Romero

Poetry has always been important in New Orleans — blending the written word, stories and the musicality that have more or less been synonymous with the city since its creation. Poetry and oral stories are how the enslaved and the exiled masses were able to pass down what little they were able to keep. It’s how tradition, another important pillar of the city of New Orleans, was first formed and preserved. And there are few (if any) poets that are more synonymous with New Orleans, both on and off the page, than Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy.

Saloy is one of those New Orleanian artists who, if you have an hour, you’ll only have to ask five questions, because the conversation will just flow, and when you leave, you remember twenty more questions you wanted to ask her. The kind of New Orleanian whose conversations feel like a warm hug. The kind of New Orleanian who teaches you more than you expected or even asked for, with a story.

It would be hard to find a truer artist to herself or New Orleans than Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy. A studious academic that writes in every genre and teaches the reader without overusing exposition, Saloy’s work is embedded in New Orleans, New Orleanians and New Orleans culture. And she writes not just for fellow academics, but for the people. It’d be hard to list her all her accomplishments, but she was most recently the Louisiana Poet Laureate from 2021-2023. Her book, “Black Creole Chronicles,” is the One Book One New Orleans selection for 2024, a local New Orleans nonprofit that supports literacy.

About when she began writing, Saloy said, “My introduction was everything from prayers to songs to the ways brothers share stories on the front porch or the sidewalk…and Black music…I listened to the radio like there was no tomorrow.”

Saloy writes a lot from the perspective of folklore, both studying it and living it. She understands the importance of what is passed down and wants to make sure that it is all passed down. As she told me, the definition of folklore is “stories passed from generation to generation.” Saloy also said, “Poetry is what happens between important dates in our time.” And poetry is important, for it is one of the most efficient and human ways of logging these events.

Saloy teaches at Dillard University, something she takes great pride in. She said she has found “a cultural and aesthetic home that suits me.” Saloy is “passing on what was given to me,” which is true as she is one of the mentors of Jericho Brown.

Saloy continues to write, to produce work, like someone who knows she has to. It is important, for her, for her loved ones, for her people. “Some people picket; I poet,” she said. Generations from now, when talking about the great New Orleans’ poets of this era, you won’t get far before mentioning Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy, the folklore poet who will be part of our folklore.