Jeremy Leon Hance is a writer and freelance environmental journalist, who also happens to cohabitate with mental illnesses. He has named his OCD Steve and his depression goes by the name of Malachi. He is the author of the memoir Baggage: Confessions of a Globe-Trotting Hypochondriac. As a journalist, Hance cut his teeth at Mongabay, beginning in 2009 and working as a lead writer and editor for six years. For over three years he wrote the blog Radical Conservation on the Guardian. Today, he is a columnist for Mongabay, writing monthly articles under the banner Saving Life on Earth: Words on the Wild.

As a journalist, he is passionate about wildlife conservation, climate change, forests, animal behavior, and indigenous people and many other topics. His works have appeared in Mongabay, the Guardian, HuffPost, Ensia, YaleE360, Sydney Morning Herald among others. A story on the Sumatran rhino was chosen for the 2019 edition of the Best American Science and Nature Writing.

In pursuit of stories, Hance has traveled to over 30 countries on five continents. He considers himself ridiculously lucky to have spent time with singing rhinos, dinosaur mammals, and angry clownfish.

Hance is a 2002 graduate of Macalester College with a major in English and minor in History as well as a 2009 graduate of St. John’s College’s Great Books Master’s Degree program. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota with his wife, daughter, and pooch. When not writing, he enjoys time with friends, cups of tea, long hikes, longer naps, even longer novels, and playing Dungeons and Dragons.

Aaron East is a 2019 graduate of Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas, where he majored in English and History. Originally hailing from Royse City, Texas, Aaron is now a graduate student of English at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. His research interests include Medieval literature and history, and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien.

Emily and Raymond of Melonlight in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, are certified professional ballroom dance instructors. They have over 40 years of combined experience teaching, performing,  and inspiring couples to make dance a part of their relationships. It's not a hobby for Emily and Raymond, it is their passion and career that they take seriously. Oh, but they have tons of fun too! It’s Melonlight's mission to deliver inspiring quality content that has a lasting impact.

- Intro music, "Let's Face the Music and Dance" by Nat King Cole, from his 1964 album, "Let's Face the Music and Dance."

Cynthia Sample has an M.F.A. in Creative Writing at Vermont College and also holds a Ph.D. in Finance from the University of Texas at Dallas. Her writing credits include stories in SLAB, Numéro Cinq, Summerset Review, Sleet, Wichita Falls Review of Literature and Art, Between the Lines, and Love After 70. She was also a finalist in the New Letters Fiction Prize. Her stories have won first places in contests such as the Arkansas Writers’ Conference and the Ozark Writers’ Conference. Find out more about Cynthia at http://www.cynthiacsample.com/.

Jody Hobbs Hesler has written ever since she could hold a pencil. She lives and writes at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Her work includes short stories, novels, feature articles, book reviews, essays, and other free-lance writing and editing. 

Growing up, Jody split her time between suburban Richmond, Virginia, and the mountains outside Winchester, Virginia. Experiences of both regions flavor her writing. 

Today, Jody teaches at Writer House in Charlottesville, Virginia and is offering an online course beginning September 19th, “Staying the Course.” It is designed for people with long-term writing goals, such as novels, memoirs, story collections, but it would also work for anyone who wants accountability and camaraderie for their writing discipline, even if they aren't shaping that discipline around a specific project. Find out more here: https://writerhouse.org/class/staying-the-course-2/2020-09-19/

Morris McCorvey has been nominated to become the Poet Laureate of Oklahoma. What an insightful conversation.

In her eleventh year of teaching both American and women’s literature,  Wendy Whelan-Stewart is an associate professor of English at McNeese State  University, where she also directs the Master of Arts in English program. She has published articles on Margaret Atwood,  Sylvia Plath, H.D., and Gwendolyn Brooks and is working on her first book.

Intro music "Yoga" by Janelle Monáe and Jidenna.

Yermiyahu Ahron Taub is a poet, writer, and translator. His works of fiction are Beloved Comrades: a Novel in Stories (Quanah, Texas: Anaphora Literary Press, 2020) and Prodigal Children in the House of G-d: Stories (London; Cambridge; New York; Sharjah: Austin Macauley, 2018), winner of two CIPA EVVY Merit Awards (LGBTQ Fiction and Religious/Spiritual Fiction) and named a finalist for a Foreword INDIES Award (Religious (Adult Fiction)). He is the author of six books of poetry: A moyz tsvishn vakldike volkn-kratsers: geklibene Yidishe lider/A Mouse Among Tottering Skyscrapers: Selected Yiddish Poems (Tel Aviv: Bibliotek fun der haynttsaytiker Yidisher literatur/Library of Contemporary Yiddish Literature, 2017), The Education of a Daffodil/Di bildung fun a geln nartsis (Saarbrucken, Germany: Hadassa Word Press, 2017), Prayers of a Heretic/Tfiles fun an apikoyres   (Austin, Tex.: Plain View Press, 2013), Uncle Feygele (Austin, Tex.: Plain View Press, 2011), What Stillness Illuminated/Vos shtilkayt hot baloykhtn (West Lafayette, Ind.:Parlor Press, 2008), and The Insatiable Psalm(Hershey, Pa.: Wind River Press, 2005). Tsugreytndik zikh tsu tantsn: naye Yidishe lider/Preparing to Dance: New Yiddish songs is a CD of nine of his Yiddish poems set to music composed by Michał Górczyński and performed by Malerai–Goldstein–Masecki (Poznan, Poland: Multikulti Project, 2014). Learn more about Yermiyahu at https://yataubdotnet.wordpress.com/.

Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg is the 2009-13 Kansas Poet Laureate, a writer, teacher, and facilitator, and coach and consultant who explores how the spoken, written and sung word can help us live more vibrant lives. Founder of Transformative Language Arts at Goddard College, Caryn is the author or editor of over 20 books of poetry, fiction, memoir, non-fiction, and anthologies. A registered songwriter with BMI, her poetry and prose has been published widely.

As a beloved workshop facilitator, she has led workshops since 1992 for adults in transition, people living with serious illness, and intergenerational and multi-cultural groups. She leads writing and singing retreats and performances with singer-songwriter Kelley Hunt through Brave Voice. She also offers writing, facilitation, and right livelihood coaching, and with Laura Packer, offers the Your Right Livelihood training.

Caryn was born in Brooklyn, and grew up there and in Manalapan, N.J. until she headed west to study journalism at the University of Missouri, where she got a labor history degree instead. She continued west to Lawrence, Kansas, where she fell in love with the land, community, and her husband. Caryn received her Ph.D. from the University of Kansas, and she has trained in organizational development and group process, grassroots organizing, poetry therapy, and teaching yoga. She is the recipient of Kansas Arts Fellowship in Poetry, the Rocky Mountain National Park artist-in-residency, and other honors.

Caryn lives in the country, just south of Lawrence, Kansas with her husband, bioregional writer Ken Lassman, two big dogs and a cat, and young adult children who visit to the delight of all the humans and animals.