About the Author

Rickey K. Hood is an award-winning poet, essayist, and playwright based in his hometown of Charlotte, North Carolina. His diverse body of work has been published both nationally and internationally, appearing in anthologies such as Journey to Timbuktu, Our Truth, and Main Street Rag. Notably, he authored and performed the original play And Still I Rise: The Life and Poetry of Maya Angelou for the Smithsonian Institution’s Anacostia Museum.

A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte with a B.A. in Religious Studies, Hood’s writing is deeply informed by his exploration of memory, grief, and spiritual searching. His latest collection, The Weight of Memory, serves as a poignant reflection on a life lived with honesty and careful attention.

What Inspired The Weight of Memory?

This book is more than a collection of literature; it is a personal journey shaped by the quiet need to understand what remains after life fundamentally changes. Rickey was inspired to write this work to honor the people he has lost and to navigate the complex questions their absence leaves behind.

Key inspirations include:

• Honoring Family Bonds: Much of the work is rooted in the experience of caring for his loved ones, specifically holding his mother, Effie, and his brother, Ronnie, in their final moments.

• Exploring Identity: Rickey writes with candor about the hidden loneliness that often exists within the Black LGBTQ+ community and the pressure to perform a specific brand of "Black Manhood".

• A Spiritual Quest: Driven by a "spirit that resists religion," Hood’s work examines how rigid religious doctrines can wound the spirit. His writing follows a transition from seeking God in buildings and certainties to finding the sacred in human connection and the simple joy of being alive.

• The Architecture of Memory: Rickey seeks to give voice to the "heavy, hallowed architecture of memory" that forms when the voices of those who walked beside us go silent.

The Weight of Memory is a witness to the fact that love, once given, does not disappear—it simply changes form and continues to walk beside us.