Black August has long been a month of remembrance for Black folks. It calls us to study and reflect, and reminds us that our liberation is unfinished. August also holds the power of collective self-defense and birthdays of ancestral teachers like James Baldwin and Marsha P. Johnson. And it carries the love and grief of remembering our comrade and coworker Kaitoria “Kai” Bankz — Aug. 26, 2025 marked her first birthday beyond this earth.

TKO’s August gatherings brought our people together through a queer community mixer and a conversation on queered spirituality — all culminating in KAI DAY on Aug. 26. We were so grateful to have Kai’s mother, family and friends join us to celebrate her life. With Invisible Histories, we began building a memorial archive in her honor and recommitted to our duty to build a future she would be proud of.

For TKO, this month affirmed that remembering is not separate from building. Each name and moment remind us of the gravity of our struggle yet the freedom of our possibilities.

Read our newsletter below!