Author Bios
John Luke Byrne is a queer writer from Nebraska, currently living in Charleston, South Carolina, where he received his MFA in poetry at the College of Charleston. His work is published in Hobart, Blood Orange Review, The Journal, and elsewhere.
Ryan Courtwright earned his MFA from Columbia College and BA from University of San Francisco. You can find his other work in Columbia Poetry Review, Linebreak, Shampoo, and collaborations in The Normal School. He currently lives in Chicago.
Ali Hatami is from Iran, Kurdistan. He writes mostly in his native tongue, Kurdish, and his published work in Kurdish includes a novel and a poetry collection, but he happens to enjoy writing in English and Persian as well. Currently, he lives in Iran, Tehran.
Will Jameson earned his MFA in poetry at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He lives in San Francisco and works as a content strategist.
Saeed Jones is the award winning-author of the memoir “How We Fight for Our Lives” and the poetry collection “Prelude to Bruise.” His work has appeared in the New Yorker, New York Times and GQ among other publications. Jones’ next book of poems, “Alive at the End of the World,” will be published by Coffee House Press this September.
Sarah Kersey is an x-ray technologist from New Jersey. She is an Assistant Features Editor for The Rumpus, and an Associate Editor for South Florida Poetry Journal. Sarah was a finalist for the 2021 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellowship. Sarah attended the Tin House Workshop in 2021. She tweets @sk__poet.
Nina Kossman is a painter, sculptor, bilingual writer, poet, translator of Russian poetry, and playwright. Among her published works are two books of poems in Russian and English, two volumes of translations of Tsvetaeva’s poems, two collections of short stories, an anthology published by Oxford University Press, and a novel.
Ben Togut is a poet and singer-songwriter from New York City. His recent work is published in Longleaf Review, The Offing, Hobart, and elsewhere. He is an undergraduate at Wesleyan University.
Randall Mann is the author of five poetry collections, most recently A Better Life (Persea Books, 2021). He lives in San Francisco.
John Poch’s work has appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, The Nation, and other literary journals. His most recent book is Texases (WordFarm 2019). He teaches at Texas Tech University.
Maw Shein Win’s most recent poetry book is Storage Unit for the Spirit House (Omnidawn, 2020) which was nominated for the Northern California Book Award in Poetry, longlisted for the PEN America Open Book Award, and shortlisted for the California Independent Booksellers Alliance’s Golden Poppy Award for Poetry. mawsheinwin.com
Lucy Zhang writes, codes and watches anime. Her work has appeared in The Offing, The Rumpus, EcoTheo Review and elsewhere. Her chapbook HOLLOWED is forthcoming in 2022 from Thirty West Publishing. Find her at https://kowaretasekai.
Gordon Mitchell Smith is a poet and wine professional. His writing has appeared in Kenyon Review, Palette Poetry, The American Journal of Poetry, Columbia Review, Los Angeles Review, and other publications. When he’s not writing or working, he’s usually on Twitter: @GordonSmithPoet. You can read his other work at: www.gordonmitchellsmith.com
Rebecca Lehmann is the author of the poetry collections Ringer (University of Pittsburgh Press) and Between the Crackups (Salt). Her poetry and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in The Missouri Review, Copper Nickel, Zone 3, Ploughshares and other venues. She is the founding editor of the online literary journal Couplet Poetry.
A.A. Vincent is a poet and essayist. They received their MFA from University of San Francisco. Their poems have appeared in places such as Quiet Lightning, Santa Clara Review, West Trestle Review, and Write Now! SF Bay, Essential Truths: The Bay Area In Color. They live in the Bay Area.
Alina Stefanescu was born in Romania and lives in Birmingham, Alabama with her partner and several intense mammals. Recent books include a creative nonfiction chapbook, Ribald (Bull City Press Inch Series, Nov. 2020). Her poetry collection, dor, won the Wandering Aengus Press Prize (September, 2021). More at www.alinastefanescuwriter.com.
David Trinidad’s latest book of poetry is Swinging on a Star (Turtle Point Press, 2017). Digging to Wonderland: Memory Pieces is forthcoming from Turtle Point in April 2022. He is also the editor of A Fast Life: The Collected Poems of Tim Dlugos (Nightboat Books, 2011) and Punk Rock Is Cool for the End of the World: Poems and Notebooks of Ed Smith (Turtle Point, 2019). Trinidad lives in Chicago, where he is a Professor of Creative Writing/Poetry at Columbia College.
Prageeta Sharma is the author of Grief Sequence, among other works. She is the founder of Thinking Its Presence, an interdisciplinary conference on race, creative writing, and artistic and aesthetic practices. She teaches at Pomona College.
Stella Wong is the author of SPOOKS, winner of the 2020 Saturnalia Books Editors Prize, and AMERICAN ZERO, selected for the 2018 Two Sylvias Press Chapbook Prize by Danez Smith. A graduate of Harvard and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Wong’s poems have appeared in POETRY, Colorado Review, Lana Turner, Bennington Review, the LA Review of Books, and more.