It was on April 20 of this year, while getting food at Chase Dining Hall and listening to an announcement on a phone call, that UNC student Melody Dalili received the life-altering news that she would be the second Youth Poet Laureate of Tennessee.
“I think when I walked out of Chase, I laid on the brick on the ground and I just sat there for a little bit, and I was like, 'What is going on?'” Dalili said.
Since then, Dalili has played an impactful role not only in her community in Tennessee, but also the community she has found in Chapel Hill, sharing the intricate story of her life and experiences through poetry.
Prior to being named Youth Poet Laureate of Tennessee, Dalili was announced as the 2022-23 Knoxville Youth Poet Laureate on April 10, 2022 when she was 16, just two years after being removed from an abusive home. The life she faced while growing up plays a heavy role in her work and her drive for change.
The gravity and importance of her new role, Dalili said, didn’t hit her until her very first event as Tennessee Youth Poet Laureate, while sitting in a hotel room after being flown back home for the occasion.
“My writing is so unique to my own personal experiences that when people say that they are moved by my poetry, it feels like they're also moved by personal experiences.” Dalili said.
After being removed from an abusive home, Dalili found herself homeless for four years, living with her father in a warehouse he owned. She dealt with the trauma and stress of her circumstances by writing poetry, and published her own book when she was 16, selling copies to friends, classmates and people all around the world.
Dalili hand-pressed and printed each copy of her first book by herself, putting it under her bed each night to flatten it.
“I feel like writing poetry for me was a way of like asking people not to forget about me,” Dalili said, “Or trying to put things into something that was permanent, so that people knew that what I went through was real.”