SIR 2020 Spring
听Artwork听听
is an artist, graphic designer, and educator. Her professional听practice includes visual art as well as user experience, book, and new media design.听She has worked as a creative director, visual artist, user experience lead, and听assistant professor of practice at North Carolina State University. Her work has听been published by Communication Arts, PRINT Magazine, MasterClass, and the听AIGA. Vuchnich鈥檚 latest work-in-progress, which includes several images featured听in this issue, is a multi-media installation that leverages digitized versions of听Henry David Thoreau鈥檚 pressed plant specimens to consider scientific data about听climate change and create a visceral connection to the natural world鈥檚 beauty at听a time of environmental crisis. |
听Poetry
"Book of Mild Regrets"听鈥斕 latest poetry collection is Partial Genius(Black Lawrence Press,听2019). Poems have recently appeared in Court Green, POETRY, Tupelo Quarterly,听and Waxwing, among others. She is a professor of English at the University of听Akron, and edits the Akron Series in Poetry. Biddinger has received awards or听fellowships from the Cleveland Arts Prize, Ohio Arts Council, and NEA.听 |
鈥& the white girl tells me i need to marry a Latino man so that my kids can be the world鈥听鈥 Em Dial is a queer, triracial poet and educator born and raised in the Bay Area.听She is an alum of the Stanford Spoken Word Collective and slam team, as well听as the Youth Speaks Artist Corps. They have received the Hoefer Prize for听Excellence in Undergraduate Writing from Stanford University and Best Poet听Award at the 2017 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational. |
is the author or editor of eighteen books including听Not All Saints, winner of the 2019 Bitter Oleander Library of Poetry Prize. The听Second O of Sorrowreceived both the Paterson Poetry Prize and the Housatonic听Book Award from Western Connecticut State University. He works as a care听giver and med tech for various disabled populations in Erie, Pennsylvania. |
is an American poet, essayist and digital curator from Detroit,听Michigan. Author of the chapbook Dream with a Glass Chamber and Salt Body听Shimmer, she has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Callaloo, and the Millay听Colony for the Arts. Her work has appeared in RHINO, Buzzfeed, James Franco听Review, THRUSH, and Furious Flower: Seeding the Future of African American Poetry,听among others. She serves on the Board of Directors for The Offing, and spends her听time in Chicago, Illinois, experimenting with photography and video narratives. |
John Gallaher鈥檚 current collection, Brand New Spacesuit, is published by BOA Editions, and poems appear in POETRY, New England Review, Crazyhorse,听West Branch, and elsewhere. |
鈥Immigrant Elegy for 脕vila鈥鈥斕 is a rabbi and poet, raised by her Venezuelan Jewish family in Boston and Caracas, and now living in Philadelphia. Her work explores queerness, diaspora, ancestry, theology, and cultivating courageous hearts. She is the author of Here is the Night and the Night on the Road (Cooper Dillon Books, 2018), and the chapbook Of Darkness and Tumbling (YesYes Books, 2017). Her poem 鈥淎 poem with two memories of Venezuela鈥 won the 2020 Minola Review Poetry Contest, judged by Doyali Islam. She has been a Pushcart Prize nominee and a finalist in the Cutthroat Journal Joy Harjo Poetry Contest. Her poetry has been published in various journals, including most recently Frontier, Foglifter, Ninth Letter, Interim, Tinderbox, and Canthius. |
听is the author of the chapbook I Ask My Sister鈥檚 Ghost听(DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press, 2020). His poems have appeared in AGNI, Best New Poets 2018, Indiana Review, Third Coast, and other journals. He is a winner听of Iron Horse Literary Review鈥檚2019 Trifecta Poetry prize, the Milton Kessler Memorial听Prize from Harpur Palate, and a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg prize. Gucciardi works听with refugee and immigrant youth in Oakland, California. |
Clemonce Heard received his BFA in graphic communications from Northwestern听State University and his MFA in creative writing from Oklahoma State University.听Heard is the 2019-2020 WICW Ronald Wallace Poetry Fellow. |
Shannon Hozinec lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her work can be found in听The Hunger, Thrush, Deluge, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere. |
鈥all the girls standing in the line for the bathroom鈥澨鈥 was born and raised in Detroit and is the author of the听poetry chapbook Capable Monsters (Bull City Press, 2020). A graduate of University听of Michigan鈥檚 MFA in poetry, his work has found homes with Indiana Review,听The Rumpus, Waxwing, and Iowa Review, among others. |
Joseph Johnson teaches in New Meadows, Idaho. He received his MFA from听the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and his work has recently appeared听or is forthcoming in Big Big Wednesday; Chicago Review; Forklift, Ohio; Pleiades;听Storm Cellar; Washington Square Review; Yalobusha Review; and elsewhere. |
Zoe Mays is a writer from Kansas whose poetry has appeared in Hobart, Little听Patuxent Review, Zone 3, and elsewhere. |
鈥Masculine Sonnet鈥澨鈥听 is a writer from Delhi, India. She studied literatures in English听from Delhi University and completed her MFA at Sarah Lawrence College, New听York. Her work has been published in Arkansas International, bitch media, BOAAT,听Glass Poetry, Hyperallergic, Hyphen, The Margins, The Shallow Ends, and elsewhere.听Sen was the 2017-18 Readings/Workshops fellow at Poets & Writers and currently听lives and teaches in Las Vegas, where she鈥檚 completing her PhD in poetry. |
鈥salat during deportation proceedings鈥澨斕 is a Filipino-Jordanian immigrant living in Washington state.听He is the author of Here I Am O My God, selected by Fady Joudah for a Poetry听Society of America Chapbook Fellowship, and Salat, selected by Cornelius Eady听as winner of the Tupelo Press Sunken Garden Chapbook Award. Their poems听have been published or are forthcoming in POETRY, Sugar House Review, The听Journal, Poetry NW, The Southeast Review, ZYZZVA, Asian American Literary听Review, and elsewhere. Tahat has earned fellowships from Hugo House, Jack Straw听Writing Program, and the Poetry Foundation, as well as a work-study scholarship听from Bread Loaf Writers鈥 Conference. They serve as a poetry editor for Moss and听Homology Lit and cohost The Poet Salon podcast. He got his start as a Seattle Poetry听Slam Finalist, a collegiate grand slam champion, and Seattle Youth Speaks Grand听Slam Champion, representing Seattle at HBO鈥檚 Brave New Voices. |
鈥hearsay鈥澨斕 is a poet and writing instructor from the East Coast. She earned听her BA from Howard University and her MFA from Cornell University, where听she also taught. Her work has been recognized by the likes of the Hurston/Wright听Foundation, Sonora Review, and Indiana Review and also appears or is forthcoming听in The Offing, Slice, Poetry Daily, Ruminate, Witness, The Southampton Review, and听elsewhere. She lives in Brooklyn, New York. |
Fiction
Lara Palmqvist is the recipient of a 2019 Elizabeth George Foundation听grant and a 2019 Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board.听She was a 2017鈥2018 Fiction Fellow in the Loft Literary Center Mentor Series.听Her writing appears or is forthcoming inThe Washington Post, Ploughshares online,听The Southampton Review, and Witness, among other publications. Her work has听also been honored with awards from the Jerome Foundation, the Kimmel Harding听Nelson Center for the Arts, Ox-Bow School of Art, Marble House Project,听the Saari Residence in Finland, the Sozopol Fiction Seminars in Bulgaria, and the听U.S. Fulbright Commission, through which she taught creative writing in Ukraine.听Originally from New Mexico, she currently lives in Minnesota. |
is the author of a novel, Fall Back Down When I Die, praised as听鈥渞emarkable and unforgettable鈥 in a starred review at Booklist and short-listed听for the First Novel Award from the Center For Fiction. He is also the author of a听memoir, The Mountain and the Fathers, and four collections of poetry, including When听We Were Birds, winner of the Oregon Book Award, and, most recently, Thieve.听His stories, essays, and poems have appeared in The Georgia Review, The Southern听Review, Orion, and The Sun. He lives with his family in western Oregon, where he听directs the creative writing program at Linfield College. |
Interview
is the author of the poetry collections Immigrant Model听and Father Dirt, translator of Liliana Ursu鈥檚 Clay and Star and Carmelia Leonte鈥檚听The Hiss of the Viper, and editor of Insane Devotion: On the Writing of Gerald听Stern. She is the recipient of two Glenna Luschei Awards from Prairie Schooner, residency fellowships from The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and Le听Chateau de Lavigny (Switzerland), an Individual Artist Fellowship from the New听Jersey State Council on the Arts, and a Fulbright fellowship to Romania. |
Deborah Woodard is the author of Plato鈥檚 Bad Horse; Borrowed Tales; and No听Finis: Triangle Testimonies, 1911. She has published several chapbooks, including听Hunter Mnemonics, which was illustrated by artist Heide Hinrichs, and translated the听poetry of Amelia Rosselli from Italian in The Dragonfly, A Selection of Poems: 1953- |
Nonfiction
Jen Kasten is a writer in the Midwest. Her work also has appeared in Waccamaw. |
Courtney Kersten is the author of Daughter in Retrograde: A Memoir. Her essays听can be seen or are forthcoming from Prairie Schooner, The Normal School, River听Teeth, Hotel Amerika, DIAGRAM, Black Warrior Review, and elsewhere. She won听the Bellingham Review鈥檚 2018 Annie Dillard Award for Nonfiction; was a Fulbright听Fellow to Riga, Latvia; and is a PhD candidate in literature at the University of听California, Santa Cruz. Kersten is currently at work on a biography about the late听superstar astrologer Linda Goodman. |
is the author of two story collections鈥Future Missionaries听of Americaand Gateway to Paradise鈥攁s well as two collections of essays鈥inscriptions for headstonesand Permanent Exhibit. He served with David Shields听as co-editor of Fakes: An Anthology of Pseudo-Interviews, Faux-Lectures, Quasi-Letters, 鈥淔ound鈥 Texts, and Other Fraudulent Artifacts. His work has appeared in venues such as The Paris Review, Glimmer Train, Ploughshares, Tin House, Virginia听Quarterly Review, Epoch, Ecotone, New England Review, DIAGRAM, Colorado听Review, The Normal School, Willow Springs, The Antioch Review, Gulf Coast,听The Collagist, Carolina Quarterly, Oxford American, The Sun, The Pushcart Prize,听and Best American Essays. Vollmer teaches creative writing and literature in the听English Department at Virginia Tech, where he is an associate professor. |