Marvin Artis: “One of the things I’m most interested in, in poetry, is the opportunity to connect things that don’t appear to be connected. To bring my own disparate parts together and to also build that infrastructure internally, and then be able to apply that to my relationships with other people. The more connections I can find between disconnected things, the better my connections are with others.”
Marvin Artis: “One of the things I’m most interested in, in poetry, is the opportunity to connect things that don’t appear to be connected. To bring my own disparate parts together and to also build that infrastructure internally, and then be able to apply that to my relationships with other people. The more connections I can find between disconnected things, the better my connections are with others.”
Nasreen Yazdani: “I once convinced my fourth grade teacher to allow me to submit all work in the form of poetry. Several tedious verses on long division later, permission was firmly rescinded. But I continued to compose poems relentlessly, undercover, year after year, and now as an adult I have given myself permission once again to share my writing. I’ve never felt so free.” (web)
Jessica Venturi: “I write poetry because I want to make something beautiful out of the suffering. I write for the perfect word—for rhythm and rhyme and the way words feel in my mouth. I write to be heard and I write for the thrill of it. I write because I read. Because literature and poetry are magic. Because when I’m hanging on someone else’s words I feel wonder and yearning all at the same time. I was born and raised in California’s East Bay Area. I earned my BA in English literature from the University of Colorado, after many years of working odd jobs to stay afloat. I am now a graduate student in English at the University of Delaware. I have been a few different things in my life thus far, but there is only one thing I know that I am. I am a writer.”
Daniel Valdez: “I write poetry because it contains beauty, honesty, and reality. Poems don’t always have to be true or emotional, but I believe they do have to capture a certain aspect of the human experience. Some poems can be meaningless and absurd, but even then they contain certain realities. Poetry is free and can be freeing, it is vast and encapsulates various concepts. I write poetry for its freedom and its transparency.”
Ryan Thier: “I’m a metallurgist who’s currently living and working in Chicago. I’ve spent time living and working in both central New York and central Illinois as well. Work and relationships factor heavily into most of my poems. I try to find the small magical tidbits that frequently pop up in both of these areas.” (web)
Julie Schultz: “Since I believe artificial intelligence is going to meaningfully refashion society, I recently retreated from corporate serfdom and returned to college after twenty years. Unexpectedly, I discovered in a writing workshop that poetry is better suited than prose to the task of wrangling with the possible outcomes of a broadly more digital future.” (web)