Manager: Linzi Garcia
Theme Contest:
Amy Sage Webb-Baza is Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Emporia State University, where she was named Roe R. Cross Distinguished Professor and directs the Donald Reichardt Center for Publishing and Literary Arts. She is managing editor for Bluestem Press and Flint Hills Review. She publishes fiction, poetry, and nonfiction, and is author of Your Own Life: Kansas Stories (Woodley Press, 2012).
Classical Poetry:
Kristin Van Tassel teaches writing and American literature at Bethany College in Lindsborg, Kansas. She writes essays and poetry about place, teaching, motherhood, and travel. Her work has appeared in literary, academic, and travel publications, including The Chronicle of Higher Education, World Hum, ISLE, The Journal of Ecocriticism, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Wraparound South, Temenos, Burningword, Capsule Stories, and About Place.
Free Verse:
Jason Ryberg is the author of fourteen books of poetry, six screenplays, a few short stories, a box full of folders, notebooks and scraps of paper that could one day be (loosely) construed as a novel, and, a couple of angry letters to various magazine and newspaper editors. He is currently an artist-in-residence at both The Prospero Institute of Disquieted P/o/e/t/i/c/s and the Osage Arts Community, and is an editor and designer at Spartan Books. His latest collection of poems is Are You Sure Kerouac Done It This Way!? (co-authored with John Dorsey, and Victor Clevenger, OAC Books, 2021). He lives part-time in Kansas City, MO with a rooster named Little Red and a billygoat named Giuseppe and part-time somewhere in the Ozarks, near the Gasconade River, where there are also many strange and wonderful woodland critters.
Narrative Poetry:
John E. Epic is the author of the non-fiction memoir, Ill Digestions, the illustrated children’s book, Such a Little Apple: the anatomy of a bully, and numerous poetry books that illuminate beauty within the mundane, meaning within the seemingly insignificant, and humor to all of life’s absurdities. As an avid advocate of the arts John E. Epic co-created DroneBEE Gazette Publishing, an agency dedicated to publishing previously unknown artists, poets, photographers and authors. Bio Pic by Rim Valiakhmetov (Moscow, Russia)
Whimsy:
Lori Brack is the author of three books of poems: A Case for the Dead Letter Detective (Kelsay, 2021), Museum Made of Breath (Spartan, 2018), and A Fine Place to See the Sky (The Field School, 2010). She lives in Lucas where she is a freelance writer for nonprofits, a writing coach and instructor.
Japanese Poetry:
Dr. Cynthia Patton has been a member of the English faculty at Emporia State University since 2000. For the past fifteen years, she has researched and taught Japanese literature and film in English translation, as well as her original fields (19th- and 20th-century British literature, literary criticism and theory). Her favorite haiku is by Yosa Buson:
harusame ya monogatari yuku mino to kasa. Spring rain: / so the story goes-- / straw raincoat and umbrella
Performance Poetry:
Matt Spezia is the Kansas Program Director for Poetry for Personal Power. In art, Matt is a national powerhouse of lyrical ability, combining an eight-time national award-winning poetry style, Kansas City hip hop, and thespian teachings. He has three albums and a book published and has appeared in an anthologized CD and book. Matt uses his platform and his art to promote self confidence and betterment, social awareness, and cultural change. Outside of art, Matt is a mentor and has worked to directly influence school children in 36 different districts. He has given numerous presentations on performing for the public forum at a number of state-wide venues and on the floor of the Kansas capitol building. Matt has experience with hosting radio shows and producing commercials, music videos, and films. Above all, Matt believes everything is a #teameffort.
New Poets:
Jason Baldinger is from Pittsburgh and looks forward to roaming the country writing poems again. His newest books are A Threadbare Universe (Kung Fu Treachery Press) and The Afterlife is a Hangover (Stubborn Mule Press). A History of Backroads Misplaced: Selected Poems 2010-2020 (Kung Fu Treachery) is forthcoming later this year. His work has been published widely across print journals and online. You can hear him read his work on Bandcamp and on lp’s by The Gotobeds and Theremonster.
Theme Contest:
Amy Sage Webb-Baza is Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Emporia State University, where she was named Roe R. Cross Distinguished Professor and directs the Donald Reichardt Center for Publishing and Literary Arts. She is managing editor for Bluestem Press and Flint Hills Review. She publishes fiction, poetry, and nonfiction, and is author of Your Own Life: Kansas Stories (Woodley Press, 2012).
Classical Poetry:
Kristin Van Tassel teaches writing and American literature at Bethany College in Lindsborg, Kansas. She writes essays and poetry about place, teaching, motherhood, and travel. Her work has appeared in literary, academic, and travel publications, including The Chronicle of Higher Education, World Hum, ISLE, The Journal of Ecocriticism, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Wraparound South, Temenos, Burningword, Capsule Stories, and About Place.
Free Verse:
Jason Ryberg is the author of fourteen books of poetry, six screenplays, a few short stories, a box full of folders, notebooks and scraps of paper that could one day be (loosely) construed as a novel, and, a couple of angry letters to various magazine and newspaper editors. He is currently an artist-in-residence at both The Prospero Institute of Disquieted P/o/e/t/i/c/s and the Osage Arts Community, and is an editor and designer at Spartan Books. His latest collection of poems is Are You Sure Kerouac Done It This Way!? (co-authored with John Dorsey, and Victor Clevenger, OAC Books, 2021). He lives part-time in Kansas City, MO with a rooster named Little Red and a billygoat named Giuseppe and part-time somewhere in the Ozarks, near the Gasconade River, where there are also many strange and wonderful woodland critters.
Narrative Poetry:
John E. Epic is the author of the non-fiction memoir, Ill Digestions, the illustrated children’s book, Such a Little Apple: the anatomy of a bully, and numerous poetry books that illuminate beauty within the mundane, meaning within the seemingly insignificant, and humor to all of life’s absurdities. As an avid advocate of the arts John E. Epic co-created DroneBEE Gazette Publishing, an agency dedicated to publishing previously unknown artists, poets, photographers and authors. Bio Pic by Rim Valiakhmetov (Moscow, Russia)
Whimsy:
Lori Brack is the author of three books of poems: A Case for the Dead Letter Detective (Kelsay, 2021), Museum Made of Breath (Spartan, 2018), and A Fine Place to See the Sky (The Field School, 2010). She lives in Lucas where she is a freelance writer for nonprofits, a writing coach and instructor.
Japanese Poetry:
Dr. Cynthia Patton has been a member of the English faculty at Emporia State University since 2000. For the past fifteen years, she has researched and taught Japanese literature and film in English translation, as well as her original fields (19th- and 20th-century British literature, literary criticism and theory). Her favorite haiku is by Yosa Buson:
harusame ya monogatari yuku mino to kasa. Spring rain: / so the story goes-- / straw raincoat and umbrella
Performance Poetry:
Matt Spezia is the Kansas Program Director for Poetry for Personal Power. In art, Matt is a national powerhouse of lyrical ability, combining an eight-time national award-winning poetry style, Kansas City hip hop, and thespian teachings. He has three albums and a book published and has appeared in an anthologized CD and book. Matt uses his platform and his art to promote self confidence and betterment, social awareness, and cultural change. Outside of art, Matt is a mentor and has worked to directly influence school children in 36 different districts. He has given numerous presentations on performing for the public forum at a number of state-wide venues and on the floor of the Kansas capitol building. Matt has experience with hosting radio shows and producing commercials, music videos, and films. Above all, Matt believes everything is a #teameffort.
New Poets:
Jason Baldinger is from Pittsburgh and looks forward to roaming the country writing poems again. His newest books are A Threadbare Universe (Kung Fu Treachery Press) and The Afterlife is a Hangover (Stubborn Mule Press). A History of Backroads Misplaced: Selected Poems 2010-2020 (Kung Fu Treachery) is forthcoming later this year. His work has been published widely across print journals and online. You can hear him read his work on Bandcamp and on lp’s by The Gotobeds and Theremonster.
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