American poet Yolanda Cornelia “Nikki” Giovanni leans on her desk next to a typewriter in front of a wall decorated with photographs, 1973. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Hulton Archive/Getty Images/Hulton Archive

Hide caption

Toggle label

Hulton Archive/Getty Images/Hulton Archive

The famous poet Nikki Giovanni has died. According to a statement from her friend and author Renée Watson, Giovanni died on Monday, December 9, after her third cancer diagnosis. She was 81 years old. “We will forever be grateful for the unconditional time she gave to us, to all her literary children throughout the writing world,” poet Kwame Alexander said in the statement.

Giovanni published her first collection of poems, Black Feeling Black Talkin 1968. It established her as an emerging figure from the Black Arts Movement. In it, Giovanni writes about the intersections of love, politics, loneliness and race. Her language is sometimes sparse and wistful, sometimes dense and fair. The final lines of “Word Poem” are: “Let us build / what we become / when we dream.”

She was born Yolanda Cornelia Giovanni, Jr. on June 7, 1943 in Knoxville, Tennessee. Although she grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and the surrounding suburbs, she returned to Nashville to attend Fisk University. There she met other writers who became leading black literary figures—Dudley Randall, Margaret Walker, Amiri Baraka, and more. During her time at Fisk, she also re-founded the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

As her writing career took off, Giovanni became a regular guest on Soul!a talk show about black arts and culture on WNET. Your conversation with the celebrated one Writer James Baldwin followed shortly after by being named “Woman of the Year” by both Ebony magazine and Mademoiselle.

Giovanni eventually found her way to Virginia Tech, where she taught English for more than three decades. There she expressed concerns about one of her students. He murdered 32 people in the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007. Speaking of shooting: Giovanni told NPR“Killing is a lack of creation. It’s a lack of imagination. It is a lack of understanding of who you are and your place in the world. Life is an interesting and good idea.”

She continued to work until her final days. With dozens of poetry collections under her belt, she was working on publishing her final volume of poetry when she died. The title is still scheduled to come out next year THE LAST BOOK.