Remembering Poet, Renée Nicole Good

At the time of her passing, I had never heard of Renée Nicole Good.

Unfortunately, thanks to state-sanctioned violence under Trump 2.0, I have spent much of the last week learning about this poet, reflecting on both her life and death, as I imagine the incalculable loss felt by Good's loved ones.

Given that my newsletter features writing grounded in Disability Justice, I questioned whether or not to devote a post to Good's tragic death, and in so doing, I was reminded of these words from the Disability Justice Primer: 

Those words follow this Disability Liberated poem, to which, I often return, in grief:

Come. You. Yes, you.
Tonight we are gathering stories, ours, yours.
Each of us with our bundles of sticks, each of us with our strands of cord.
The word in your pocket is what we need.
The song in your heart, the callous on your heel.

Come out of the forest, the woodwork, the shadows to this place of freedom
quilombo, swamp town, winter camp, yucayeque
where those not meant to survive laugh and weep together
share breath from mouth to mouth, pass cups of water, break bread
and let our living bodies speak.

Our history is in our bodies what we do to breathe, how we move, the sounds we make
our myriad shapes, our wild gestures
far outside the boundaries of what’s expected
the knowledge bound into our bones, our trembling muscles, our laboring lungs
like secret seeds tied into the hair of our stolen ancestors
we carry it everywhere.

Come beloveds from your narrow places
from your iron beds, from your lonely perches
come warm and sweaty from the arms of lovers
we who invent a world each morning
and speak in fiery tongues.

Come you with voices like seagulls
dissonant and lovely, with hands like roots and twigs.

Come limbs that wander and limbs like buds and limbs heavy as stone
come breathless and swollen and weary, fevered and wracked with pain.

Come slow and heavy, come wary and scarred, come sweet and harsh and strong. Come arched with pleasure, come slick with honey
come breathless with delight.

We say with our feet, with our backs and hands
no life belongs to another, our bodies are not acreage
livestock, overhead, disposable tools.

We hum as we travel, songs heavy with maps that
lead us back to ourselves
singing you, yes you, are irreplaceable.

Here we are, and here we are fruitful
our stories flower, take wing, reproduce like windblown seeds.

No surgeon’s knife can cut the lines of spirit. Our family tree remains.

- from “Listen, Speak” in Kindling: Writings On the Body by Aurora Levins Morales

Since Good's public execution, I have learnt that a Black man, Keith Porter, was also killed by ICE, so if able, please support his daughters here.

It took a few days of percolating on it, in connection with disabled loved ones who were also struggling with the news of Good's state-sanctioned killing, but eventually, I realized that I felt called to write about this, because of how intimately familiar I am with being deemed disposable, as I reflect on her final words to Jonathan Ross, the ICE agent who subsequently shot her in the face:

As a fat brown queer disabled immigrant woman, I am often deemed both disposable, and a "fucking bitch," so no wonder I felt the need to remember Good, who described herself on IG as a “poet and writer and wife and mom and shitty guitar strummer from Colorado; experiencing Minneapolis, MN.”

BTW, on the off chance that you are looking for a gifted equity practitioner and educator for virtual services like writing, facilitation, and consulting, you are welcome to peruse my CV below, and explore my services here.

Like Amanda Gorman wrote, "Somewhere, in the pitched deep of our grief, Crouches our power," so if you, like me, find yourself mourning Good, I urge you to dig deep to find your power to resist the fascist forces that killed her, like she deserves, as the queer creative who wrote this award-winning poem in 2020, whose 3 children are left to somehow process this vile killing of their mother.

For me, finding my power looks like connecting the state-sanctioned violence that killed Good with the Disability Justice work I remain committed to:

If interested in learning more about the Disability Justice framework developed by Sins Invalid over 2 decades ago, I invite you to attend my 1st free/donations-welcome virtual Disability Justice 101 Workshop for 2026 on Zoom, which is scheduled for 7-9pm EST on Saturday, January 31, 2026, in honour of countless beloved disabled ancestors like Alice Wong, Patty Berne, Tinu Abayomi-Paul, Shafiqah Hudson, Stacey Park Milbern, Ki'tay D. Davidson, Ruby Goorahoo, Audre Lorde, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, etc.

From February 2026, DJ workshops will initially be made available to paid monthly Ko-fi subscribers, so please consider supporting my DJ work here.

If new to my virtual spaces, I give registrants the 1st 5 minutes to arrive before starting, but generally continue to let folx in until the end. Usually, materials are emailed at least a day before, should advance access aid with feeling comfortable to participate. Attendees are welcome to engage on their own terms, i.e., with no implicit expectation of being on camera, communicating verbally or in the chat, etc. Around the halfway point, a 15-minute-long break is facilitated, after which participants are invited to explore a writing prompt during designated quiet time of 10-20 minutes, depending on preferences. Once the timer ends, participants are invited to share what they wrote or discuss how the process went for them, based on capacity, comfort, interest, vibes, etc. Throughout the workshop, my approach is consent-based, i.e., folx are encouraged to read slides, share feedback, etc., and only those who volunteer to do so are invited to engage further, as there is no pressure to participate beyond one's capacity.

If able to contribute to my survival following my ex's financial abuse of at least $183,364, which further disabled me, alongside white supremacist workplace trauma, e-transfers within "Canada" may be sent to krystaljagoo@gmail.com and funds may be sent via PayPal below, so please consider supporting me! 🙏🏾