About Jacinta V. White
Poet • Facilitator • Creative Catalyst
For more than two decades, Jacinta V. White has been cultivating spaces where art, healing, and transformation intersect. A poet, facilitator, and leadership coach based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, her work lives at the threshold between the creative and the sacred—where words become a form of witnessing, where silence speaks, and where communities gather to remember their wholeness.
After the sudden passing of her father—with whom she had shared her first published poem (Young Detroiter, 1996)—Jacinta discovered poetry as her lifeline. It became both mirror and medicine, helping her navigate grief and reimagine what it means to be alive. Out of that reckoning grew The Word Project (TWP), a community initiative originally designed to give urban youth a safe space to share their stories through poetry. Nearly three decades later, TWP has expanded its reach to serve people of all ages and walks of life, fostering creative expression as a catalyst for individual and collective healing. From that work emerged Snapdragon: A Journal of Art & Healing, an international online quarterly amplifying the voices of artists around the world.
A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (B.A., Speech Communications) and Georgia State University (M.P.A., Nonprofit Management), Jacinta began her career in public relations and nonprofit leadership before returning home to North Carolina to focus on writing and community-based arts. She has studied Poetry Therapy with Dr. Sherry Reiter at the Creative Righting Center in New York and trained alongside John Fox, Terrance Hayes, Stuart Dischell, and Cecilia Woloch.
As director of The Word Project, Jacinta leads workshops, keynotes, and residencies across the country, and is recognized as a North Carolina Arts Council Teaching Artist. Beyond poetry, she is an experienced consultant and facilitator, collaborating with organizations such as EmcArts, UNC School of the Arts, and The Kenan Institute for the Arts to nurture creative leadership and systems change. She is also founding principal of Deeper Dive Consulting, where she serves as a certified coach and corporate trainer supporting leaders in aligning purpose, presence, and impact.
Jacinta is the author of two poetry collections:
Her poems and essays have appeared in What Matters Anthology (Jacar Press), Press 53 Open Awards Anthology, My Soul to His Spirit: Soulful Writings of African American Daughters to Their Fathers, and numerous journals. She also served as editor of Walking With God (Duncan & Duncan, 1996).
Across her body of work—as poet, editor, facilitator, and thought partner—Jacinta continues to remind artists and leaders that thriving is not about striving harder, but about living in rhythm with what is already whole.
For more than two decades, Jacinta V. White has been cultivating spaces where art, healing, and transformation intersect. A poet, facilitator, and leadership coach based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, her work lives at the threshold between the creative and the sacred—where words become a form of witnessing, where silence speaks, and where communities gather to remember their wholeness.
After the sudden passing of her father—with whom she had shared her first published poem (Young Detroiter, 1996)—Jacinta discovered poetry as her lifeline. It became both mirror and medicine, helping her navigate grief and reimagine what it means to be alive. Out of that reckoning grew The Word Project (TWP), a community initiative originally designed to give urban youth a safe space to share their stories through poetry. Nearly three decades later, TWP has expanded its reach to serve people of all ages and walks of life, fostering creative expression as a catalyst for individual and collective healing. From that work emerged Snapdragon: A Journal of Art & Healing, an international online quarterly amplifying the voices of artists around the world.
A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (B.A., Speech Communications) and Georgia State University (M.P.A., Nonprofit Management), Jacinta began her career in public relations and nonprofit leadership before returning home to North Carolina to focus on writing and community-based arts. She has studied Poetry Therapy with Dr. Sherry Reiter at the Creative Righting Center in New York and trained alongside John Fox, Terrance Hayes, Stuart Dischell, and Cecilia Woloch.
As director of The Word Project, Jacinta leads workshops, keynotes, and residencies across the country, and is recognized as a North Carolina Arts Council Teaching Artist. Beyond poetry, she is an experienced consultant and facilitator, collaborating with organizations such as EmcArts, UNC School of the Arts, and The Kenan Institute for the Arts to nurture creative leadership and systems change. She is also founding principal of Deeper Dive Consulting, where she serves as a certified coach and corporate trainer supporting leaders in aligning purpose, presence, and impact.
Jacinta is the author of two poetry collections:
- Resurrecting the Bones: A Journey through African American Churches and Cemeteries in the Rural South (Press 53, 2019)
- broken ritual (Finishing Line Press, 2012)
Her poems and essays have appeared in What Matters Anthology (Jacar Press), Press 53 Open Awards Anthology, My Soul to His Spirit: Soulful Writings of African American Daughters to Their Fathers, and numerous journals. She also served as editor of Walking With God (Duncan & Duncan, 1996).
Across her body of work—as poet, editor, facilitator, and thought partner—Jacinta continues to remind artists and leaders that thriving is not about striving harder, but about living in rhythm with what is already whole.
See Jacinta's CV that includes speaking engagements here.
See press Jacinta has received based on her work with TWP.