About

. choose: formal bio | casual & “random” bio | photos | “press” | about the blog

Born in Little Rock and raised in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, Torie Michelle is a poet, freelance writer, editor/proofreader, and tutor currently residing in (the ‘burbs of) Atlanta, Georgia, where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree in creative writing and English from Emory University. Torie, a Jill-of-all-trades working to master her passions, dabbles in print and web graphic design and acting—she’s self-taught in the former, and she minored in the latter in college.

Torie’s poems, articles, photos, or designs have appeared in Mythium, the New York Times, Un-Mute.com, various Emory University-related publications (including Black Star, for which she served as Editor-in-Chief and Design Director, The Emory Wheel, and Alloy), and elsewhere.

In February 2008, Torie was named Strength of Nature/Profectiv’s Miss Campus Fresh Face 2007-2008 in the company’s inaugural competition of the kind. In that capacity, she appeared in JET, Black College Today, and Hype Hair magazines.

Acting credits include Emory’s student theater productions of for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf (Lady in Purple) and The Vagina Monologues.

While Torie’s experience and training ranges from journalism and new media to instrumental music (clarinet) and stage performance, she is presently focusing on her poetry and is at work on a chapbook of poems. Though she’s always furthering her education through reading and taking courses, her next intended major educational leaps include pursuing an MFA in poetry and a certificate in graphic design.

Torie is available to do freelance/project-based work in writing and graphic design and to perform as a poet, actress, or commercial model. Her resume is available upon request. You can contact her by sending an email—just click here–or by connecting on Twitter or Facebook.

(back to the top)

(08/06/2010): Hey! I’m Torie. Yes, with an e. It’s an adorable little name my mom found in a newspaper, loved, and thought would be simple for people to spell and remember. Now after my 20+ years of being called “Toya” and being addressed in writing as “Tori,” “Torrie,” “Torrey,” and even “Toni,” she totally knows how wrong she was. No worries. I’m used to it

I’m an 80s baby who grew up in a city where you could get anywhere in no more than 15 minutes. I was a girl who spent hours outside playing in the dirt and gravel and “flying” on a swing my Granny built. I even had an ant farm at one point. Geeky? Anyway. I don’t really like the outdoors now.

I’m a mostly unintentional non-conformist. I prefer honesty and straightforwardness. I believe in karma. I love art and creativity. I love interesting experiences with fascinating people because that’s the stuff of my poems; I most often write about people/interaction. I was eight when I published my first poem. If you’ve read it, you know that is no indication of genius…lol To address a couple of FAQs: [1] I am not currently writing a novel. [2] I am not becoming a teacher any time soon. But I am humbled by the fact that people think I’m that patient. I am not experiencing a quarter-life crisis. Don’t you think that term is silly?

When people seriously talk about personal branding, I think of individuals treating themselves like toothpaste; there are a lot of brands and sub-brands but with virtually the same ingredients (for people: training, skills, experience, reading the same self-help blogs/books, etc.), you’ll get virtually the same result which is evidenced every day in blogs that shout out authenticity and differentiation but sound like they’re all written by the same person.

I’m sarcastic. Not 100% cynical. I code-switch; it seems to be a necessary evil. I’m not obsessed with obtaining a flashy lifestyle or being filthy rich. I’ll settle for boundless happiness for those I love and myself. Wait, that’s not settling at all. I do what makes me happy rather than what others think I should be doing in order to be what they identify as “happy.”

I try to say the Serenity Prayer every day, but religion is not really my cup o’ tea. Speaking of tea, I like mine to be peppermint. And…speaking of sayings and quotations, here are a few I like:

“Do not speak—unless it improves on silence.”

“The greatest generosity is non-attachment.” – Atisha

“True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.” –MLK Jr.

“…any story, sad or happy, is always precariously close to being other than it is. Doesn’t take much to alter a familiar scene into chaos.” — “Looking at Emmett Till,” John Edgar Wideman

“…I want you to immortalize yourself. I want you to write a book, a good book, full of hard, earnest thoughts. A book that will make people better and happier because they read it.” -–Frances E.W. Harper, from Fancy Etchings

“Pick up a pen and write up a story, pick up a camera and make a documentary, pick up a guitar and make a song. If you do not write your own self into history, there is no guarantee that anyone else will, and when history is done and written, it will be as if you were never here. So, if you want record of your own body having lived here and now, make that record so that it will be there.” –Staceyann Chin

And last but not least on this page of facts about me that are likely useless to you, here are a few of my favorite things: “My Favorite Things,” [color] red, [number] 13, Louisiana hot sauce (that’s “Louisiana” as in the bottle with the unnecessary quotation marks), Simply Lemonade, Italian food, “Un bel di” (Madama Butterfly), [movies] psychological thrillers, comedies, action | Will Smith, Johnny Depp, the Brat Pack, [TV] Fresh Prince reruns, Hell’s Kitchen, Project Runway, So You Think You Can dance, White Collar, Psych, Glee, Jeopardy, Medium, Criminal Minds, Persons Unknown, Law & Order: SVU…(I watch too much TV), earrings, pens, the Lakers, leopard and zebra print (go PBHS Zebras!), Mickey Mouse, hip hop, em dashes, ampersands, and not obsessing about punctuation unless I’m proofreading.

(back to the top)

Photos

Strength of Nature/Profectiv Miss Campus Fresh Face Photo Shoot SamplesStrength of Nature/Strength of Nature/Profectiv Miss Campus Fresh Face Photo Shoot

Photography: Reggie Anderson, [web]

Stylist: Natalie Spencer, [web]

(back to the top)

Assorted “Press”

Emory Magazine Autumn 2009 | News Makers: Minority Voices Speak in Black Star Magazine

Fly Girl of the Week @ Fly, May 19, 2009

Strength of Nature/Profectiv named Torie Michelle Anderson its first Miss [Campus] Fresh Face in February 2008. She appears as M[C]FF in JET Magazine’s November 2008 Barack Obama Special Collector’s Edition, the spring 2008 issue of Black College Today Magazine, and the May/June 2008 issue of Hype Hair magazine.

Our Opinion: ‘Rainbow’ is Bright, The Emory Wheel – October 2006

Poetic Performance Appeals to Wide Audience, The Emory Wheel – October 2006