THE POETRY QUESTION: TPQ20

Join Chris in a one-on-one with EiC of Riot in Your Throat Press and author of and Winner of the Jack McCarthy book prize (Write Bloody, 2023), Courtney LeBlanc, about passions, process, pitfalls, and Poetry!

Courtney LeBlanc is a Word Perv. She is a poet, feminist, runner, dog mom who lives in Arlington, Virginia.

LeBlanc is the author of the full length collections Exquisite Bloody, Beating Heart (Riot in Your Throat) and Beautiful & Full of Monsters (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press). They are the winner of the Jack McCarthy book prize and their next collection of poetry will be published by Write Bloody in spring 2023. She is also the founder and editor-in-chief of Riot in Your Throat, an independent poetry press. They love nail polish, tattoos, and a soy latte each morning.

Join Chris and Courtney in a sit down with Kristin Garth, the Editor in Cheif of Pink Plastic House, for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! 

Kristin Garth is a Pushcart, Best of the Net & Rhysling nominated sonnet stalker.  She is a 2020 Best of the Net Finalist. Her sonnets have stalked journals like Glass, Yes, Five:2:One, Luna Luna and more.

She is the author of two micro chapbooks of poetry The Legend of the Were Mer (Thirty West) and Glitter & Guillotines (Hedgehog Poetry Press). In addition, she has authored numerous chapbooks of poetry including Shut Your Eyes, Succubi,  Pink Plastic House, Atheist Barbie (Maverick Duck Press), Golden Ticket (Roaring Junior Press), Shakespeare for Sociopaths, Dewy Decimals (The Hedgehog Poetry Press), The Death of Alice in Wonderland (Alien Buddha Dress), Girlarium (Fahmidan Press), and Sock Slut (Slang Media Lab).

In addition, she has authored two full-length poetry collections Candy Cigarette Womanchild Noir (Hedgehog Poetry Press) and The Stakes (Really Serious Literature). Garth is also the author of three experimental novels — Flutter Southern Gothic Fever Dream, Crow Carriage and The Avalon Hayes Mysteries. With collaborators, she has co-authored three books of poetry, A Victorian Dollhousing Ceremony, Good Girls Games and Pensacola Girls.

She is also the dollhouse architect/editor in chief of Pink Plastic House a tiny journal. When she’s not writing sonnets, she’s photographing her socks for Instagram and her Barbies for the poets of the Pink Plastic House. You can see her sonnets, socks and Barbie photography on Twitter, @lolaandjolie and @pphatinyjournal; Instagram, @kristiningridgarth and @pinkplastichouse. You can also read her editorial poetry column for Pink Plastic House, The Dollhouse Architect’s Digest.

Join Chris in a one-on-one sit down with Shaindel Beers, Poetry Editor of Contrary, about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!

Shaindel Beers’ poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. She is currently an instructor of English at Blue Mountain Community College in Pendleton, Oregon, in Eastern Oregon’s high desert and serves as Poetry Editor of Contrary. A Brief History of Time, her first full-length poetry collection, was released by Salt Publishing in 2009. Her second collection, The Children’s War and Other Poems was released in February of 2013. Her most recent collection, Secure Your Own Mask, won the White Pine Poetry Prize for 2017.

Shaindel was raised in Argos, Indiana, a town of 2,000 people. She studied literature at Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Alabama (BA), and at the University of Chicago (MA) before earning her MFA in Creative Writing (Poetry) at Vermont College of Fine Arts. She has taught at colleges and universities in Illinois and Florida but feels settled in the Eastern Oregon high desert town of Pendleton. Her awards include: First place Karen Fredericks and Frances Willitts Poetry Prize (2008), Grand Prize Co-winner Trellis Magazine sestina contest (2008), First place Dylan Days Poetry Competition (2007), Award-winning poem published, Eleventh Muse (2006), Honorable mention, Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Awards (2005), Honorable mention, Juniper Creek/Unnamed Writers Award(2005), and the title poem from this collection, “A Brief History of Time,”was nominated for a Pushcart prize (2004).

Join Chris & Courtney of The Poetry Question in a sit down with Julian Randall, author of Refuse (Pitt, 2018), Pilar Ramirez & the Escape from Zafa (Holt), and the upcoming The Dead Don't Need Reminding: Essays (Bold Type Books), about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry. 

Julian Randall is a Living Queer Black poet from Chicago. He has received fellowships from Cave Canem, CantoMundo, Callaloo, BOAAT and the Watering Hole. Julian is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize. Julian is the winner of the 2019 Betty Berzon Emerging Writer Award from the Publishing Triangle.

His writing has been published in New York Times Magazine, Ploughshares, and POETRY, and anthologized in Black Boy Joy (which debuted at #1 on the NYT Best Seller list), Wild Tongues Can’t Be Tamed and Furious Flower.

He has essays in The Atlantic, Vibe Magazine, Los Angeles Review of Books, and other venues. He holds an MFA in Poetry from Ole Miss.

He is the author of Refuse (Pitt, 2018), winner of the 2017 Cave Canem Poetry Prize and a finalist for a 2019 NAACP Image Award, as well as the middle grade novel Pilar Ramirez And The Escape from Zafa (Holt, Winter 2022), and The Dead Don’t Need Reminding: Essays (Bold Type Books, Spring 2023).

He can be found on Twitter @JulianThePoet.

Join Chris and Courtney in a sitdown with Jason B. Crawford, author of Year of the Unicorn Kidz (Sundress Publications), about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!

jason b. crawford (They/Them) is a writer born in Washington DC, raised in Lansing, MI. Their debut chapbook collection Summertime Fine is out through Variant Lit. Their second chapbook Twerkable Moments is out from Paper Nautilus Press. Their third chapbook, Good Boi, is forthcoming from Neon Hemlock press in fall 2021. Their debut Full Length Year of the Unicorn Kidz will be out in 2022 from Sundress Publications. crawford holds a Bachelor of Science in Creative Writing from Eastern Michigan University and is the co-founder of The Knight’s Library Magazine. crawford is the winner of the Courtney Valentine Prize for Outstanding Work by a Millennial Artist, Vella Chapbook Contest, and Variant Lit Chapbook Contest.  They are the 2021 OutWrite chapbook contest winner in poetry. Their work can be found in Split Lip Magazine, Glass Poetry, Four Way Review, Voicemail poems, FreezeRay Poetry, HAD, among others. They are a current poetry MFA candidate at The New School. Website: JasonBCrawford.com Instagram: jasonbcrawford Twitter:  @jasonbcrawford Facebook: By Jason B. Crawford

Join Chris and Courtney Margolin of The Poetry Question in a sitdown with Saeed Jones, author of Alive at the End of the World (Coffee House Press), about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! 

Saeed Jones is the author of the memoir HOW WE FIGHT FOR OUR LIVES, winner of the 2019 Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction, as well as the poetry collection PRELUDE TO BRUISE, winner of the 2015 PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award for Poetry and the 2015 Stonewall Book Award/Barbara Gittings Literature Award. Their debut poetry collection was also a finalist for the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and awards from Lambda Literary and the Publishing Triangle in 2015. Their next poetry collection, ALIVE AT THE END OF THE WORLD, is forthcoming from Coffee House Press in Fall 2022.

Join Chris and Courtney in a sit down with Kyle Tran Myhre (Guante), author of Not a Lot of Reasons to Sing, But Enough (Button Poetry), about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!

Kyle Tran Myhre (also known as Guante) is a poet, educator, and activist based in Minneapolis, MN. His work explores the relationships between identity, power, and resistance, and he’s performed everywhere from the United Nations, to music festivals like Eaux Claires and Soundset, to countless colleges, universities, and conferences. He’s also been part of two National Poetry Slam championship teams, given a TEDx Talk, and published two books via Button Poetry.

Whether writing about men’s roles in ending gender violence, challenging dominant narratives related to race and racism, or just telling stories about the different jobs he’s had, Tran Myhre strives to cultivate a deeper, more critical engagement with social justice issues, one based in both empathy and agency. An educator as well as a performing artist, Tran Myhre completed his Masters studies at the University of Minnesota with a focus on spoken word, critical pedagogy, and social justice education; in that spirit, his performances use poems as jumping-off points for authentic dialogue, critical thinking, and community-building.

Join Chris and Courtney of The Poetry Question in a sit down with Mx. Faylita Hicks, author of Hoodwitch (Acre Books) and EiC of Black Femme Collective, about passions, process, pitfalls, and Poetry!

FAYLITA HICKS (she/they) is the author of HoodWitch (Acre Books, 2019), a finalist for the 2020 Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Poetry, the 2019 Balcones Poetry Prize, and the 2019 Julie Suk Award. The Editor-in-Chief of Black Femme Collective, they currently serve as the 2022 Writer-in-Residence for the Texas After Violence Project. In June 2021, they became a voting member of the Recording Academy/Grammys as a spoken word artist.

Hicks is the recipient of fellowships and residencies from Black Mountain Institute,  Broadway Advocacy Coalition, Civil Rights Corps, The Dots Between, Jack Jones Literary Arts, Lambda Literary, Tin House, and the Right of Return USA. Their work has been featured in or is forthcoming in Adroit, American Poetry Review, the Cincinnati Review, Ecotone, Kenyon Review, Longreads, Poetry Magazine, The Rumpus, Slate, Texas Observer, Yale Review, amongst others. Their poetry is anthologized in The Long Devotion: Poets Writing Motherhood, What Tells You Ripeness: Black Writing on Nature, and When There Are Nine (Pangyrus, 2021).

Their personal account of their time in pretrial incarceration in Hays County is featured in the ITVS Independent Lens 2019 documentary, “45 Days in a Texas Jail,” and the Brave New Films 2021 documentary narrated by Mahershala Ali, “Racially Charged: America’s Misdemeanor Problem.”

Hicks received a BA in English from Texas State University-San Marcos and an MFA in Creative Writing from Sierra Nevada University.

Join Chris of The Poetry Question in a one-on-one about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry with the author of Finna (Penguin Random House), Nate Marshall.

Nate Marshall is an award-winning writer, editor, educator, and MC. His most recent book, Finna, was recognized as one of the best books of 2020 by NPR and The New York Public Library. His first book, Wild Hundreds, was honored with the Black Caucus of the American Library Association’s award for Poetry Book of the Year and The Great Lakes College Association’s New Writer Award. He was also an editor of The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop. Marshall co-wrote the play No Blue Memories: The Life of Gwendolyn Brooks with Eve Ewing. He also wrote the audio drama Bruh Rabbit & The Fantastic Telling of Remington Ellis, Esq., which was produced by Make-Believe Association. Marshall records hip-hop as a solo artist and with the group Daily Lyrical Product.

Marshall is an experienced and versatile educator, working with learners of all ages in both academic and community settings. He co-wrote Chicago Public School's first literary arts curriculum and develops lesson plans using creative writing to help participants discuss social justice, mental health, community development, and other issues. He is an assistant professor of English at Colorado College. He previously served as the Assistant Director of Wabash College’s Malcolm X Institute of Black Studies and the Director of National Programs at Young Chicago Authors. Marshall has taught in a number of traditional and community-based settings including Wabash College, Young Chicago Authors, Northwestern University, InsideOut Literary Arts, and the University of Michigan.

Nate is a member of The Dark Noise Collective and co-directs Crescendo Literary, a partnership that develops community-engaged arts events and educational resources as a form of cultural organizing. As a young person Nate won Chicago’s Louder Than A Bomb Youth Poetry Festival and was a finalist at Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam.

Nate was born at Roseland Community Hospital and raised in the West Pullman neighborhood of Chicago. He is a proud Chicago Public Schools alumnus. Nate completed his MFA in Creative Writing at The University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers' Program. He holds a B.A. in English and African American Diaspora Studies from Vanderbilt University. Marshall has received fellowships from Cave Canem, The Poetry Foundation, and The University of Michigan. Nate loves his family, friends, Black people, dope art, literature, history, comedy, arguing about top 5 lists, and beating you in spades.

Join Chris & Courtney of The Poetry Question in a sit down conversation with Joan Kwon Glass, author of Night Swim (Diode Editions), about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!

Joan Kwon Glass (B.A./M.A.T. Smith College) is the author of “Night Swim,” winner of the 2021 Diode Editions Book Contest and the micro chapbook “Bloodline,” winner of the 2021 Harbor Review Washburn Prize, and author of poetry chapbooks “How to Make Pancakes For a Dead Boy” (Harbor Editions, 2022) & “If Rust Can Grow on the Moon” (Milk & Cake Press, 2022). She was a Runner-Up for the 2021 Sundress Publications Chapbook Contest, & a 2021 finalist for the Harbor Review’s Editor’s Prize, the Subnivean Award & the Lumiere Review Writing Contest, as well as a semi-finalist for the Thirty West Chapbook Contest, Ralph Angel Poetry Prize & the Five South Poetry Prize. She serves as Poet Laureate (2021-2025) for the city of Milford, Connecticut, Poetry Co-Editor for West Trestle Review and Poetry Reader at Rogue Agent. Joan’s work explores trauma, grief, memory, motherhood, and recovery. She is a mixed-race (hapa) Korean American who grew up in Michigan and South Korea & she finds inspiration in the writings of Rachel McKibbens, Lucille Clifton, Eugenia Leigh, Margaret Atwood, Anne Sexton & Ellen Bass. Since 2018, her poems have been nominated multiple times for the Pushcart Prize and for Best of the Net.

Pre-order NIGHT SWIM now!