Language Run Amok

Lucy Alford, born in Charlottesville, Virginia, is a Harper-Schmidt Fellow at the University of Chicago, where she teaches and writes about poetry and poetics. Her first scholarly book, Forms of Poetic Attention, is forthcoming with Columbia University Press (fall 2019.) Her poems have been published in Streetlight, The Warwick Review, Harpur Palate, Literary Matters, and, in Italian translation, Atelier. She’s currently seeking a home for her poetry collection, Annals.

Sarah Bates has an MFA in Poetry from Northern Michigan University and currently teaches at Southern Utah University. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Diagram, Boston Review, Fugue, Zone 3, The Rumpus, Best New Poets 2017, Seneca Review, The Normal School, and Hotel Amerika, among others. Her manuscript, O-Six, was a finalist in the 2018 Saturnalia Poetry Book Prize. Her manuscript, Tender, was a finalist in the 2018 Bateau Press Chapbook contest.

Jennifer Karmin’s multidisciplinary work has transpired at festivals, artist-run spaces, and on city streets across the U.S., Cuba, Japan, Kenya, and Europe. Performances have been featured at the Poetry Project, the Walker Art Center, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, and Woodland Pattern Book Center. Books include the text-sound epic Aaaaaaaaaaalice and The Sexual Organs of the IRS a collaboration with Bernadette Mayer. She teaches creative writing to immigrants at Truman College and has been a Visiting Writer at Naropa University, Oberlin College, California Institute of the Arts, plus a myriad of sites. Since 2005, she has curated the Red Rover Series.

Lauren Mallett‘s poetry appears in Tupelo Quarterly, Smartish Pace, RHINO Poetry, Barrow Street, Sou’wester, Spoon River Poetry Review, and other journals. Lauren is the recipient of scholarships from the Indiana University Writers’ Conference and the Indiana Writers’ Consortium. She teaches English at Purdue University and yoga at Be Moved Power Yoga.

Denise Miller is an Ohio born and Michigan raised poet, professor and activist who believes that it is the poet’s job to tell the truth. Their publication awards and nominations include a 2018 Pushcart Prize nomination for “It”, a 2016 Pushcart Prize nominee for Dear Spectators, a 2015 Pushcart Prize nominee and a 2015 American Book Award nominee for Core, and a 2016 Rattle Chapbook Award prize winner for Ligatures.

Cesca Janece Waterfield completed an MFA in Creative Writing from McNeese State University and is currently a PhD student at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Her work has appeared in or is forthcoming from Map Literary Journal, Scalawag Magazine, Writers Resist, Deep South, and others. She received the 2017 Editor’s Prize in Fiction from MARY: A Journal of New Writing, judged by Natalie Baszile.

Nina Corwin — WMG Literary Events Curator.
Nina Corwin is a published poet, Founding Editor for Fifth Wednesday Journal and psychotherapist/advocate for victims of sexual assault. She is the author of two books of poetry, The Uncertainty of Maps and Conversations With Friendly Demons and Tainted Saints. Her work has appeared in ACM, Forklift OH, Hotel Amerika, New Ohio Review, Southern Poetry Review, Verse and has been nominated for the Pushcart prize. Corwin is an Advisory Editor for Fifth Wednesday Journal and co-edited Inhabiting the Body: A Collection of Poetry and Art By Women. She has read and performed her work across the country, at times set with musical or choreographic compositions.

Jennifer Steele – WMG Literary Events Outreach Coordinator.
Jennifer Steele is a published poet and educator and serves as Partnerships Coordinator for Teen Services at Chicago Public Library.  She served as co-founder and co-curator of the Revolving Door Reading Series. Her work has appeared in Another Chicago Magazine, Callaloo Journal, Columbia Poetry Review, Warpland Journal, So To Speak, and others, and is a Callaloo Creative Writing Workshop fellow. She has taught creative writing and digital media arts across Chicago since 2008 and has collaborated with numerous youth organizations and cultural institutions, designing innovative arts programming.

Kurt Heintz – WMG Literary Events Audio Recordist.
Kurt Heinz once taught computer graphics programming at Columbia College, and worked as an independent web developer. He’s since become the lead video director at Britannica. Heintz is known for his poetry videos, begun in the early 1990s. He also videoconferenced his colleagues’ poetry in the late 1990s — years before Skype and the iPhone. He was a technical advisor to the Electronic Literature Organization in its earliest years, and is the video content editor for Another Chicago Magazine.

Thank you Angela Narciso Torres, for your wonderful work and support for WMG and our Literary Program!