LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Charmaine Arjoonlal is a writer and social worker who lives with her husband and two spoiled dogs in Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada. When she’s not squeezing in writing, she enjoys hanging out in coffee shops, biking and swimming in cold lakes. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The Rumpus, MUTHA, Last Stanza Poetry Journal, Reckon Review and elsewhere. You can find Charmaine on twitter @ Arjoonlal on Instagram @charmainearjoonlal or visit her website charmainearjoonlal.wordpress.com.
Susan J. Atkinson is an award-winning poet. Her work has appeared in journals, anthologies and online. Atkinson’s debut collection, The Marta Poems was published by Silver Bow Publishing in 2020 and in 2021 Catkin Press published her chapbook, The Birthday Party, The Mariachi Player and The Tourist. Her second collection, all things small, will be published in Spring 2024. New work is forthcoming in The Queen's Quarterly and The New Quarterly.
Yasmin Zadeh Balbuena is a photographer and educator born in London and currently based in Barcelona. Trained as a graphic designer at Camberwell College of Arts, she went on to work in live audiovisuals and light installations and now specializes in photography and art education.
Heather Birrell is the author of the Gerald Lampert award-winning poetry collection, Float and Scurry, and two story collections, Mad Hope (a Globe and Mail top fiction pick for 2012) and I know you are but what am I?. TheToronto Review of Books called Mad Hope “completely enthralling, and profoundly grounded in an empathy for the traumas and moments of relief of simply being human”. She lives in Toronto with her mother, partner, two daughters, and a whoodle named Angus. www.heatherbirrell.com
Sonja Boon is a writer, researcher, teacher, and flutist currently living in Kjipuktuk (Halifax). Her work has appeared in numerous journals, including Riddle Fence, Geist, ROOM, and The Ethnic Aisle, as well as in anthologies. Her memoir, What the Oceans Remember: Searching for Belonging and Home, appeared in 2019.
Alex Carrigan (he/him) is a Pushcart-nominated editor, poet, and critic from Alexandria, Virginia. He is the author of Now Let’s Get Brunch: A Collection of RuPaul’s Drag Race Twitter Poetry (Querencia Press, 2023) and May All Our Pain Be Champagne: A Collection of Real Housewives Twitter Poetry (Alien Buddha Press, 2022). He has had fiction, poetry, and literary reviews published in Quail Bell Magazine, Lambda Literary Review, Barrelhouse, Sage Cigarettes (Best of the Net Nominee, 2023), Stories About Penises (Guts Publishing, 2019), and more. For more information, visit carriganak.wordpress.com or on Twitter @carriganak.
Audrey T. Carroll is the author of What Blooms in the Dark (ELJ Editions, 2024), Parts of Speech: A Disabled Dictionary (Alien Buddha Press, 2023), and In My Next Queer Life, I Want to Be (kith books, 2023). Her writing has appeared in Lost Balloon, CRAFT, JMWW, Bending Genres, and others. She is a bi/queer/genderqueer and disabled/chronically ill writer. She serves as a Diversity & Inclusion Editor for the Journal of Creative Writing Studies, and as a Fiction Editor for Chaotic Merge Magazine. She can be found at AudreyTCarrollWrites.weebly.com and @AudreyTCarroll on Twitter/Instagram.
Olivia Hanson is a poet born and raised in Fredericton, New Brunswick with poems published in Dalhousie’s 2020 edition of Fathom, and one poem with Femke Magazine. Currently, Hanson is completing a Bachelor of Science at the University of New Brunswick, as well as a Certificate in Publishing.
Kay Johnson has published in the fields of adult education and arts-based learning. She has gravitated to poetry in response to uncovering her family’s hidden stories and exploring difficult childhood memories. Kay is an instructor at Athabasca University and divides her time between her homes in British Columbia and Alberta. She has a forthcoming poem in Acta Victoriana.
Kim June Johnson is a singer-songwriter, composer and poet living on Vancouver Island. Her short poems and short nonfiction has appeared in Room, Prairie Fire, FOLKLIFE Magazine, Arc Poetry, River Teeth’s Beautiful Things blog and elsewhere. she is a recent graduate of Lighthouse Writers’ Poetry Collective.
Wren Jones is a writer and outdoor enthusiast often found / lost walking the ravines of Toronto. A recent graduate of The Writers Studio program at Simon Fraser University, her poems have been published in Pine Row Press, Untethered, Arboreal and other wonderful journals. Wren’s middle grade novel, The Real Dealio, was a finalist in the 2021 CANSCAIP/Writers Union of Canada’s National Writing for Children contest. You can visit her work at wrenjones.ca
Luke Koesters is a queer, Asian-American poet from Omaha, NE. He is currently attending the University of Nebraska at Omaha where he is pursuing a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fiction and Poetry. He is currently working with and had work accepted by 13th Floor, UNO’s literary magazine.
Taylor Marshall is a writer based out of Regina, Saskatchewan on Treaty 4 lands. Taylor is a creative writing major and is currently working on a historical fiction novel as part of her graduate thesis project at the University of Regina. Taylor’s writing often ruminates on mercurial possibilities of selfhood along with the accompanying internal and external metamorphoses reflective of grief, change, and death.
Terri McCord's latest work is The Beauts with Finishing Line Press. Her work has been included in several anthologies. She is a visual artist as well and loves to create visual works that speak to the literary ones. She teaches and works with different ages.
Christine Moore (she/her/hers) grew up in rural Northern California surrounded by nature. Her childhood was spent primarily outdoors, where she learned the joy and fragility of life. She holds an MFA in poetry from the University of San Francisco and has written professionally for more than 20 years. Her poems have appeared in Pasadena Review, 26: C A journal of poetry and poetics, and her forthcoming Chapbook Lent Words, will be published by Quillkeepers Press. She is a mom, wife, journalist, creative writing instructor, cancer survivor, certified sommelier (cohost of the series Wine & Word), and facilitator of a women's group in her community. Find her online at WriteYum.com and @writemoore.
Jane-Jack Morales has always loved to write and has worked at it on and off over the course of her life. She is an occupational therapist specializing in the therapeutic art of Myofascial Release Therapy who is now semi-retired and very happy to finally have time to practice writing.
Masha Mutli discovered pinhole a few years ago while searching for something unique that might slow down the process and show emotion first. Born in Moscow, Russia, she tries to capture her own world she lives in. Find out more on instagram @eisenmash
Jamie O’Halloran is the author of four chapbooks, most recently Corona Connemara & Half a Crown. She has published widely in Irish, UK and US publications, including Poetry Ireland Review, Southword, Banshee, Crannóg, One Hand Clapping, The Night Heron Barks, and Prairie Schooner. Her poetry reviews appear, or are forthcoming, in Tupelo Quarterly, The Lit Pub, The Laurel Review, and Tinderbox. She lives in Connemara in the West of Ireland.
Hailing from South Central, Los Angeles, Tauwan Patterson is a Black + Queer Poet and recent graduate of the MFA Creative Writing Program at Queens University of Charlotte, North Carolina. His work has recently appeared in the inaugural edition of the online literary magazine Cool Beans Lit, and will also appear in the forthcoming Moonstone Arts Center anthology Which Side Are You On? With his poetry Tauwan aims to, in the words of the great Poet and Thinker Marcus Jackson, announce his freedom and presence. Making a sound that echoes in the end that says Tauwan Patterson. No more. No less.
Bernard Pearson’s work appears in many publications, including; Aesthetica Magazine , The Edinburgh Review, Crossways, The Gentian, Nymphs The Poetry Village, Beneath The Fever, The Beach Hut Little stone In 2017 a selection of his poetry ‘In Free Fall’ was published by Leaf by Leaf Press. In 2019 he won second prize in The Aurora Prize for Writing.
kerry rawlinson is a mental nomad. She left Zambia decades ago to explore and landed in Canada. Fast forward: she’s still barefoot, tiptoeing through dislocation & belonging. Awards: Glittery Literary and Edinburgh International flash contest winner; notable poem Best Canadian Poetry; Pushcart nomination; Honorable mention/ finalist for several contests, e.g. Proverse & Fish Poetry; Canterbury Poetry; Room; National Poetry Society and Palette. Recent work in: Topic Take Up; Grain; Freefall; Rochford St. Review; Prism Review; Event Poetry; Prairie Fire, and more. When not challenging established norms, kerry kayaks and drinks too much (tea). kerryrawlinson.com @kerryrawli
Monty Reid is an Ottawa writer with 13 books to his credit. Most recent publications include Garden (Chaudiere) and Meditatio Placentae (Brick) and chapbooks from above/ground, post/ghost, Book*hug and elsewhere. Born in Saskatchewan and now living in Ontario, he was the Managing Editor of Arc Poetry Magazine for many years and the Director of VerseFest, Ottawa's international poetry festival, for almost a decade.
Todd Robinson is the author of two poetry collections, most recently Mass for Shut-Ins (U of Nebraska P, 2018). His work has appeared or is forthcoming in North American Review, The Pinch, Notre Dame Review, Superstition Review, and Sugar House Review. He is an Assistant Professor in the Writer's Workshop at the University of Nebraska-Omaha and caregiver to his partner, a disabled physician. Learn more at www.toddfather.net.
Hugh Simmons received a BFA in writing and publishing in 1985, after which he pursued a career in social work. He has maintained a relationship with writing over the years but made it a top priority beginning in 2019, writing daily and attending workshops. One of the gifts of growing older is the appreciation of what to do with the time one has.
Fawn Ward is a copywriter, editor and author based in the US Pacific Northwest who strives to create emotional work with a strong sense of place that roots readers in experience and memory. Fawn’s poetry and prose has thus far been featured in the Reed College Creative Review.
Jordan Williamson is a father and poet from London Ontario. His work has been featured in The Temz Review, Tilted House and “Stones Beneath the Surface” a poetry anthology from Black Mallard Poetry.