Tawanda Mulalu was born in Gaborone, Botswana. His first book, 'Please make me pretty, I don’t want to die' was selected by Susan Stewart for the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets, was listed as a best poetry collection of 2022 by The Boston Globe, The New York Times and The Washington Post, and was a finalist for the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry. Tawanda’s poems appear in Brittle Paper, Lana Turner, Lolwe, The New England Review, The Paris Review and elsewhere. He lives (for now, I guess) in Austin, TX, where he is a fellow at the Michener Center for Writers.