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Novus Spring 2025 Contributors

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L. Ward Abel

L. Ward Abel’s work has appeared in hundreds of journals (Rattle, Versal, The Reader, Galway Review, Main Street Rag, others), including two recent nominations for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and he is the author of four full collections and ten chapbooks of poetry, including his latest collection, Green Shoulders: New and Selected Poems 2003–2023 (Silver Bow, 2023). He is a retired lawyer and teacher of literature, and he writes and plays music (Abel and Rawls). Abel lives in rural Georgia.

JC Alfier

JC Alfier’s (they/them) most recent book of poetry, The Shadow Field, was published by Louisiana Literature Press (2020). Journal credits include Faultline, New York Quarterly, Notre Dame Review, Penn Review, Raleigh Review, Southern Poetry Review, and Vassar Review. They are also an artist doing collage and double-exposure work.

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Jeff Bien

Jeff Bien is an internationally acclaimed poet, musician, activist, and highly regarded meditation and consciousness teacher. His work has been published, translated and performed in eighty countries. Recent poems have been featured in 1749 Online World Literature Magazine (Hungary), Jintian (China), The Antigonish Review, The Montreal International Poetry Anthology, Vallum, The Notre Dame Review, as well as several seminal poems, ‘As the walls came down’, ‘Kyiv’ and ‘My mother in Gaza’, which have been rendered into more than thirty languages, are to be released by a prominent Italian filmmaker, as a poetic documentary and accompanying short films, in April/May 2025.

Wendy BooydeGraaff

Wendy BooydeGraaff’s poems have been included in Cutleaf, Barzakh, About Place Journal, Dunes Review, and anthologized in Under Her Eye (Blackspot Books), Midwest Futures: Poems & Micro-Stories from Tomorrow’s Heartland (forthcoming from Middle West Press, March 2025), and Not Very Quiet (Recent Works Press). Born and raised in Ontario, Canada, she now lives in Michigan, United States.

Zachary Bos

Zachary Bos studied in the MFA program at Boston University. He was named runner-up in the 2023 Hearst Poetry Prize and has had recent writing Vroom!, Old Moon, and The Muse Journal. He directs the publishing activity of Pen & Anvil Press out of an office above Bonfire Bookshop in North Central Massachusetts.

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L.F. Conrad

L.F. Conrad is currently a freshman at Cumberland University. She has been writing since she was three years old, ever since she was instructed to write down her dramatic and imaginative stories. She plans to pursue a career in writing and she looks forward to her next few years at Cumberland. This is her first publication in Novus Literary Arts Journal.

Peter Conrad

Peter C. Conrad holds a Bachelor of Education and his MA from the University of Saskatchewan. He has been a teacher, editor, instructional designer, published articles, wrote lectures for multiple art history and design courses for the Art Institute Online, and published three Canadian histories. He was a runner-up of the My Dream Writing Contest 2024, appeared in Wingless Dreamer Publisher’s 2024 anthology Summer Fireflies 2. His work appears in numerous literary journals worldwide and short stories broadcast on CBC radio. When Peter is not writing he is painting and drawing. He now lives in Calgary.

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M. F. Drummy

M F Drummy holds a PhD in historical theology from Fordham University. The author of numerous articles, essays, poems, reviews, and a monograph on religion and ecology, his poetry has appeared in dozens of journals, literary magazines, and anthologies. His debut full-length collection of poetry from MSR Publishing, as well as a chapbook of haibun, will both be forthcoming later this year. Originally from Massachusetts, he and his way cool life partner of over 20 years enjoy splitting their time between the Colorado Rockies and the rest of the planet. He can be found at https://www.instagram.com/miguelito.drummalino/

Cristian Dunn

Cristian Dunn is a senior majoring in Creative and Professional Writing and minoring in English at Cumberland University. He recently finished writing a poetry chapbook titled Sandfallen Saints. When Cristian is not spending his time writing, he enjoys listening to songs from musicals.

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Leith Fae

Leith Fae is a lover of all things art, to non-exhaustively include poetry, photography, music, and fiction. She can be found walking nature trails with her poetry notebook & camera readily available.

Davin Faris

Davin Faris is a student of philosophy and literature at St. John’s College, in Annapolis, Maryland. His writing has been featured by the New York Times, Patagonia Magazine, the Baltimore Science Fiction Society, Livina Press, Ink & Marrow (2024 Pushcart Prize nominee), and others. He is a submission reader for ONLY POEMS.

Catherine Ferrell

Cathy Socarras Ferrell is a second-generation Cuban-American poet, writer, and educator from Central Florida. She finds inspiration in walking (anywhere), family, and the Sandhill cranes in her yard. She enjoys playing with form, space, and the sounds of language. Her work can be found online at Poetry Breakfast (upcoming), Red Noise Collective, Quibble.Lit, sinkhole, and Compulsive Reader, and in the scholarly collection, Shakespeare and Latinidad, edited by Trevor Boffone and Carla Della Gotta. Connect with Cathy at ferrellwords.com.

Frank William Finney

Frank William Finney is a poet from Massachusetts. A recipient of The Letter Review Prize for Poetry, his poems have appeared in Brussels Review, Fairfield Scribes, Penn Journal of Arts and Sciences (PJAS), The Paradox Magazine, Route 7 Review, Songs of Eretz Poetry Review, and elsewhere. His chapbook The Folding of the Wings was published in 2022 by Finishing Line Press.

Christian Fisher

Christian Fisher is a junior at Cumberland University, pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in English. He has dreams of penmanship & publication, but otherwise intends to teach English in Japan as a career. Hobbies include reading, concert going, writing, and studying Japanese… lots of studying.

Jonathan Fletcher

Originally from San Antonio, Texas, Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (Poetry) from Columbia University School of the Arts. He has been published in Acropolis Journal, The Adroit Journal, Arts Alive San Antonio, The BeZine, BigCityLit, Book of Matches Literary Journal, Catch the Next: Journal of Ideas and Pedagogy, Colossus Press, Curio Cabinet, Door is a Jar, DoubleSpeak, Emerge Literary Journal, Five South, Flora Fiction, FlowerSong Press, fws: a journal of literature & art, Glassworks, Half Hour to Kill, Heimat Review, The Hooghly Review, Hyacinth Review, Infrarrealista Review, The Institutionalized Review, LONE STARS, Midway Journal, The MockingOwl Roost-An Art and Literary Magazine, MONO., Moot Point, The Muse, Naked Cat Publishing, The Nelligan Review, The New Croton Review, New Feathers Anthology, OneBlackBoyLikeThat Review, The Opal, Open Ceilings, Otherwise Engaged Journal: A Literature and Arts Journal, The Phare, Quibble, Rigorous, riverSedge: A Journal of Art and Literature, Route 7 Review, The San Antonio Express-News, San Antonio Living, San Antonio Public Library, Speakeasy, Spoonie Press, Synkroniciti, Tabula Rasa Review, The Thing Itself, TEJASCOVIDO, Unlikely Stories Mark V, Vagabond City Literary Journal, voicemail poems, Voices de la Luna: A Quarterly Literature & Arts Magazine, Waco WordFest, Whale Road Review, Wishbone Words, and Yearling: A Poetry Journal for Working Writers. Additionally, his work has been featured by The League of Women Voters of the San Antonio Area and at the Briscoe Western Art Museum and the San Antonio Museum of Art. In 2023, his work was also chosen as a finalist for the Plentitudes Prize in Poetry. That same year, his work was also chosen as a finalist for Synkroniciti’s Poetry Prize for its Issue, “Broken.” He has also been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Additionally, he has served as a Columbia Artist/Teacher for New York City’s iHOPE, a specialized school for students with traumatic brain injuries, as well as a poetry editor for Exchange, Columbia University’s literary magazine for incarcerated writers and artists. In 2023, he won Northwest University Press’s Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. Currently, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow.

Cal Freeman

Cal Freeman is the music editor of The Museum of Americana: A Literary Review and author of the books Fight Songs (Eyewear 2017) and Poolside at the Dearborn Inn (R&R Press 2022). His writing has appeared or is forthcoming in many journals including Image, The Poetry Review, Verse Daily, Under a Warm Green Linden, North American Review, The Moth, Oxford American, River Styx, and Hippocampus. His poems have been anthologized in The Poet’s Quest for God (Eyewear 2016), RESPECT: The Poetry of Detroit Music (Michigan State University Press 2020), I Wanna Be Loved By You: Poems On Marilyn Monroe (Milk & Cake Press 2021), What Things Cost: An Anthology for the People (University Press Kentucky 2022), and Beyond the Frame (Diode Editions 2023). He is a recipient of the Devine Poetry Fellowship (judged by Terrance Hayes), winner of Passages North’s Neutrino Prize, and a finalist for the River Styx International Poetry Prize. Born and raised in Detroit, he teaches at Oakland University and serves as Writer-In-Residence with InsideOut Literary Arts Detroit.

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Lillie Gibson

Lillie Gibson is a sophomore at Cumberland University studying Creative and Professional Writing and English. This is her first publication in Novus Literary Arts Journal.

Chris Girman

Chris Girman is an associate professor of nonfiction writing at a Mid-Atlantic university, and he’s also an immigration attorney who uber drives during the summer. His books include The Chili Papers and Mucho Macho: Seduction, Desire, and the Homoerotic Lives of Latin Men. His poetry and creative non-fiction have appeared in Salt Hill Journal, Hobart, Dreich, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, American Book Review, The Rumen, Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, and the anthology What I Didn’t Know about Becoming a Teacher.

John Grey

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, City Brink and Tenth Muse. Latest books, “Subject Matters”,” Between Two Fires” and “Covert” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Hawaii Pacific Review, Amazing Stories and Cantos.

Ben Groner III

Ben Groner III is the author of the poetry collection Dust Storms May Exist (Madville Publishing), winner of the 2024 American Fiction Award for Religious Poetry and named the Best Poetry Collection of 2024 by The Nashville Scene. His work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Orison Anthology, and been published in Peatsmoke Journal, GASHER, South Carolina Review, Rust & Moth, and elsewhere. Formerly a bookseller at Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tennessee, you can see more of his work at https://bengroner.com/

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Matt Hanson

Matt A Hanson is a poet from Massachusetts based in Istanbul. The first of his ten-poem series Blue Voyage appeared at dipity. This decad cycle is inspired by Azra Erhat, an early translator of classical Greek verse into modern Turkish. He archives his writings at FictiveMag.com

Lola Hobson

Lola Hobson is a writer and poet based in North Wales where she studies English Literature. She has previously been published in Wingless Dreamer’s ‘Echoes of Frost and Fantasies’ anthology where she came 2nd place in the contest. She has also been posted on PoetryFest’s blog.

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Shelby Jones

Shelby Jones is a student at Wilson Central High School and is a proud member of the BluePrints Yearbook staff. She is from Mount Juliet, Tennessee, and is planning on attending the University for Creative Careers in Savannah, Georgia.

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Korrine Key

Korrine Key is a senior at Cumberland University and will graduate in the spring of 2024. Her major is in Creative Writing with a minor in English. Korrine discovered in high school that she enjoyed writing poetry and has been working to improve her writing since then. She takes part in many other creative activities such as art and music. She participates in Concert, Jazz, Marching band, and Choir. The arts have always been a passion of hers. She has been published in the Novus Literary Arts Journal and is working as an editor for the journal as well.

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E.P. Lande

E.P. Lande, born in Montreal, has lived in the south of France and now, with his partner, in Vermont, writing and caring for more than 100 animals. Previously, as a Vice-Dean, he taught at l’Université d’Ottawa, and he has owned and managed country inns and free-standing restaurants. Since submitting less than three years ago, more than 90 his stories and poems have found homes in publications on all continents except Antarctica. His story “Expecting” has been nominated for Best of the Net. His debut novel, “Aaron’s Odyssey”, a gay-romantic-psychological thriller, is to be published in 2025.

Michael Lauchlan

Michael Lauchlan has contributed to many publications, including New England Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The North American Review, Louisville Review, Poet Lore, and Lake Effect. His most recent collection is Trumbull Ave., from WSU Press.

Liam Leslie

L. Leslie is an emerging writer and educator born and raised in Wyoming. He is passionate about dynamic language and advocates for intentionality. Words are meant for more, or less, accuracy when describing the strange and wide world we live in—make them live long.

Bryana Lorenzo

Pushcart Prize and Best of Net nominee Bryana Lorenzo is a Cuban and Nicaraguan American short story writer. She’s had her fiction featured in Outlander Zine, The Graveyard Zine, Rhodora Magazine, Le Château Magazine, The Literary Canteen, Pile Press, Agapanthus Collective, Novus Literary Arts Journal, io Lit, The Talon Review, White Wall Review, Birdie Zine, Occulum Journal, Caustic Frolic Magazine, Same Faces Collective, Art of Life Magazine, As Alive Journal, and Twin Bird Review. She’s currently attending UCLA for Political Science

Kaylee Lowe

Kaylee Lowe lives in Tennessee and recently graduated with a Creative Writing degree from Cumberland University. Poems from her senior project chapbook, “Black Apron,” have been published in New Square literary journal, Cafe Review, and here in Novus Literary Arts Journal. She plans to pursue a M.F.A. in Creative Writing.

Lana Lowe

Lana is an undergraduate student majoring in English at Cumberland University. She has published one children’s book and two YA novels. Her essay, “Fort Nashborough,” was selected for Volunteer State Community College’s 2022-2023 edition of Best Essays. Lana loves to write, read, and paint. You can follow her @WritingEclipses on nearly all social media and her artwork can be found under #LLoweArts on Instagram.

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Kimberly Madura

Kimberly Madura is a writer, essayist, and social worker. Originally from Indiana, she currently writes from a cabin in the woods of Vermont.

Gordon W. Mannenga

Gordon W. Mennenga grew up in a small Iowa town and has worked as a field hand, a truck driver, a wedding singer, a high school English teacher, and a college professor of creative writing and film studies. Publications include work in Jabberwock Literary Review, North American Review, South 85, Epoch, and Hamilton Stone Review. He made his first appearance on Spotify last year. Gordon’s work has been featured on National Publish Radio and produced by the Riverside Theatre Company.

Leonydes Matis

Leonydes Matis is a rising senior majoring in Creative and Professional Writing with a marketing minor. She is a proud Romanian American who has a heart for the Lord. She aspires to be a full time author who doesn’t shy away from different writing forms or strange and big ideas. She enjoys a good book and someone to listen to her rants after she’s done. She’s known for her letters and endless love for all who meet her. If you’re ever in need, she’s always there to fix the problem— or try to— and lend a listening ear in a way only she could.

Lynn Marie Moody

Lynn Marie Moody is a junior attending Wilson Central High School who spends much time writing and working to achieve her goals.

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Will Neuenfeldt

Will Neuenfeldt studied English at Gustavus Adolphus College and his poems are published in Capsule Stories, Months to Years, and Red Flag Poetry. He lives in Cottage Grove, MN, home of the dude who played Steven Stifler in those American Pie movies and a house Teddy Roosevelt slept in.

Matthew Nisinson

Matthew Nisinson (he/him) lives in Queens, NY with his wife and daughter and their two cats. He has a JD, and a BA in Latin. Each summer he grows chili peppers. By day he is a bureaucrat. His poetry has appeared in Boats Against the Current, en*gendered, Hyacinth Review, and Milk Press, among others.

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Kaitlyn Owens

Kaitlyn Owens is a product manager and poet based in Richmond, Virginia. With roots in Indiana and Tennessee, she writes both formal and free verse poetry exploring family history, identity, and modern relationships. Her work has appeared in Hare’s Paw, Canvas Creative Arts Magazine, and Wingbeats: Exercises and Practice in Poetry, and she is completing her first collection of poetry.

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John Pring

John Pring is a poet and author based in the UK, where he is a Masters candidate at the University of Sussex. His work has been featured in The Passionfruit Review, MONO, Oroboro, Letter Review, Qu Literary, The Banyan Review, The Tomahawk Creek Review, Dolorem Ipsum, The Rising Phoenix Review, and others.

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K Roberts

K Roberts is a writers whose creative work has appeared in the college journals Soundings East, Common Ground Review, Isotrope, Axon: Creative Expressions, and independent magazines in the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Europe. Roberts is a reader in fiction and creative non-fiction for three literary magazines.

Ed Ruzicka

Ed Ruzicka has published three full-length books of poetry, most recently, “Squalls” (Kelsey Press, 2024). Ed’s poems have appeared in the Atlanta Review, the Chicago Literary Review, Rattle, Canary and have received Pushcart nominations. Ed, who is also the president of the Poetry Society of Louisiana, lives with his wife, Renee, in Baton Rouge.

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Terry Sanville

Terry Sanville lives in San Luis Obispo, California with his artist-poet wife (his in-house editor) and two plump cats (his in-house critics). He writes full time, producing stories, essays, and novels. His stories have been accepted more than 580 times by journals, magazines, and anthologies including The American Writers Review,Bryant Literary Review, and Shenandoah. He was nominated four times for Pushcart Prizes and once for inclusion in Best of the Net anthology. Terry is a retired urban planner and an accomplished jazz and blues guitarist – who once played with a symphony orchestra backing up jazz legend George Shearing.

Thomas Sims

Thomas Sims holds a B.S. in Biology from the Templeton Honors College at Eastern University. He currently teaches sixth grade science and eleventh grade philosophy/literature in Chandler, Arizona. His work has been featured by “Beyond Words,” “An Unexpected Journal,” “In Parenthesis,” and “The GGP Collective.”

Travis Stephens

Travis Stephens is a tugboat captain who resides with his family in California. Recent credits include: Gyroscope Review, 2River, Sheila-Na-Gig, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Raven’s Perch, Crosswinds Poetry Journal, Gravitas and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature.

Alex Stolis

Alex Stolis lives in Minneapolis; he has had poems published in numerous journals. Two full length collections Pop. 1280, and John Berryman Died Here were released by Cyberwit and available on Amazon. His work has previously appeared or is forthcoming in Piker’s Press, Ekphrastic Review, One Art Poetry, Black Moon Magazine, and Star 82 Review. His chapbook, Postcards from the Knife-Thrower’s Wife, was released by Louisiana Literature Press in 2024, RIP Winston Smith from Alien Buddha Press 2024, and The Hum of Geometry; The Music of Spheres, 2024 by Bottlecap Press.

Emma Sullivan

Emma Jane Sullivan is a writer and artist living in Springfield, Missouri. She is currently teaching and studying in the Department of English at Missouri State University. She is currently working on a novel. This is her first publication.

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Charles Thomas

Charles Thomas lives in Tennessee. Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Poem, San Pedro River Review, Poetry New Zealand, Spoon River Poetry Review, Friends Journal, WorshipWeb of the Unitarian Universalist Association, and Remington Review have published other poems of his. He plans to self-publish a collection.

Travis Thomas

Travis is a writer of short fiction and poetry. He lives in Lebanon, Tn. and works at the Lebanon-Wilson County Public Library. He enjoys crochet and being outdoors. He can be reached at danjon81@icloud.com.

Russell Thorburn

Russell Thorburn is the author of four books of poems. Somewhere We’ll Leave the World, published by Wayne State University Press, draws on the poet’s own experiences while imagining fictional characters and personal heroes. In a previous book, Misfit Hearts, he chronicles the making of The Misfits through the filming-location photographs of Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift. In Let It Be Told in a Single Breath, his latest book published by Cornerstone Press, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, he picks up where he left off with recurring characters and a younger self in dislocations of time and space. He has received numerous grants, including a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. The Upper Peninsula’s first poet laureate, Thorburn teaches composition at Northern Michigan University.

Angela Townsend

Angela Townsend is the Development Director at Tabby’s Place: a Cat Sanctuary. She graduated from Princeton Seminary and Vassar College. Her work appears or is forthcoming in over 120 literary journals, including Arts & Letters, Chautauqua, Paris Lit Up, The Penn Review, The Razor, Still Point Arts Quarterly, Terrain.org, and The Westchester Review. Angie has lived with Type 1 diabetes for 33 years, laughs with her poet mother every morning, and loves life affectionately.

Alan Tucker

Alan D. Tucker is a native Tennesseean who relays his experience of the world through literary-fictive storytelling. He holds a Master of Arts in English and considers fiction the most authentic way of portraying the human experience. His work has appeared in Avalon Literary Review and Novus Literary Arts Journal.

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Emma Wells

Emma is a mother and English teacher. She has poetry published with various literary journals and magazines. She writes flash fiction, short stories and novels. She is currently writing her sixth novel.

Evan Wilburn

Evan Wilburn is a sophomore at Cumberland University. This is his first publication in Novus Literary Arts Journal.

Evan Morgan Williams

Evan Morgan Williams has published over fifty short stories in literary magazines famous and obscure, including Kenyon Review, ZYZZYVA, Alaska Quarterly Review, and Antioch Review. He has published three collections of short stories: “Thorn,” winner of Chandra Prize at BkMk Press in 2014, “Canyons: Older Stories” self-published in 2018, and “Stories of the New West,” published by Main Street Rag Press in 2021. He holds an MFA, tattered and faded, from the University of Montana in 1991. Williams has retired after 29 years as a Language Arts teacher in Oregon’s toughest middle school.

Melody Wilson

Melody Wilson’s poems appear in Catamaran, Watershed, VerseDaily, West Trade Review, Emerson Review, Crab Creek Review, and elsewhere and her manuscript Madre Dura was a finalist for the Catamaran Prize and the Louisville Review National Poetry Prize. She received her MFA from Pacific University. Find more of her work at melodywilson.com.

Nicole Bethune Winters

Nicole Bethune Winters is a poet, writer and multi-faceted artist. Her first collection, brackish, was published by Finishing Line Press, and her work has appeared in Backlash Journal, Wild Roof Journal, and Seaborne Magazine. When she isn’t writing or wheel-throwing, Nicole is likely at the beach, on a trail, climbing, or exploring new landscapes with her dog. She currently resides in Southern California, where she works as a full-time artist from her home studio.

Ashley Wood

Ashley Wood is a sophomore at college and is majoring in Creative and Professional Writing. The first thing you need to know about her is that she is from southern California and loves the beach, hiking, and reading. She started to love reading because when she was younger she had a challenging time reading, which made her parents make her read more to improve her reading skills. It worked–a little too well. Most of her inspirations for her stories appear when she is listening to music, working out, or running.

Art Contributors

Sarah Pierce

Sarah Pierce is a chemist who has fallen in love with art. She enjoys exploring new watercolor and gouache techniques.

David Michael Jackson

David Michael Jackson is a retired Whirlpool product engineer, a mechanical engineer, artist, musician, songwriter, poet, and web publisher who has shown his work at his site,  Artvilla.com, since 1998 when he and the internet were young. David’s songs are in Spotify and all platforms under the Artvilla.com/The Orchard label. He is originally from Utah and lives in the Nashville area.

Lana Lowe

Lana is an undergraduate student majoring in English at Cumberland University. She has published one children’s book and two YA novels. Her essay, “Fort Nashborough,” was selected for Volunteer State Community College’s 2022-2023 edition of Best Essays. Lana loves to write, read, and paint. You can follow her @WritingEclipses on nearly all social media and her artwork can be found under #LLoweArts on Instagram.

Kayla Key

Kayla Key is a junior attending Smith County High School in Carthage, TN. Her field of study is currently undecided but has always had a love for music, art, and science. Kayla’s interest in science stemmed from experiments in the sixth grade as well as at home. Drawing has been an outlet since she was eight. First starting out with pencils, then gradually transferring to digital opening up so many possibilities. She is currently working on a digital art portfolio to be completed during her senior year. Creating digital art will always have a special place in her life and when that is not enough, playing Alto Saxophone is second best. She has played the saxophone since the sixth grade as well. Kayla is a member of the Smith County High School Band where she is Drum Major and the only Saxophonist.

James Reade Venable

James Reade Venable was born in Manhattan, New York. He has been published in Black + White Photography, Dodho, F-Stop and many more. He is a 2x London Photo Festival Monthly Competition Winner and was on the Shortlist for the Storytelling category in this years 500px Global Photography Awards and was a finalist for the 2023 Monochromatic Awards by Dodo. He is also an actor and is currently Henry Dorris in the BBC series Hidden Assets. He lives for his wife and daughter. He lives in New York City at the moment.

Kerry Rawlinson

Kerry Rawlinson is a mental nomad who left Zambia decades ago to explore and landed in Canada. Fast forward: she’s still barefoot, tiptoeing through dislocation & belonging. Kerry’s photo-art awards include: Makarelle; Rattle; CAGO Online Gallery. Newer publications: Inscape, Wild Roof Journal, NonBinary Review, Touchstone, Artists Responding…; Sunspot Journal, QueenMob’s Teahouse, Synchronized Chaos, amongst others. Kerry’s also an award-winning poet (Princemere Poetry Prize 2024) & writer (Edinburgh International Flash contest 2020) and volunteer Curator of Kelowna Airport Art Gallery. kerryrawlinson.com @kerryrawli

Kymberlee Norman

Kymberlee Norman is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores personal growth and the areas of human development in psychology. Her pieces also explore the debate between nature versus nurture in their influence on development. While minoring in psychology, Norman discovered an interest in how growth occurs in unique ways through its four levels: emotional, physical, cognitive, and social. Norman has also worked at a preschool for four years, which is another area part of her interest in growth. The wooden puzzle with an image of a puppy was inspired by the puzzles done with the students there.

Megan Whitfield

Megan Whitfield (b. 1985) is a self-taught representational painter living in Annapolis, Maryland. Her award-winning work has been published in Artists Network Magazine, PleinAir Magazine and Modern Impressionist Magazine and on permanent display at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. In addition to producing highly sought-after fine art, Megan has worked as a cover artist for publishing houses over the last 14 years. Megan has developed a love for coastal scenes, wetlands, and maritime skies, which has been inspired by having lived surrounded by oceans, waterways and seascapes. While she grew up along the banks of the Susquehanna River in Central Pennsylvania, as the spouse of a Naval Officer, she has lived and traveled throughout the Mid-Atlantic Seaboard for the last 17 years. Her paintings reflect a deep understanding of maritime environments and portray emotionally driven scenes of the shorelines of the rivers, harbors, and bays, which serve as the arterial waterways that give life to America. Since she began exhibiting her art in 2021, Megan has been accepted into numerous juried shows and won several awards in international fine art competitions. She is a member of the American Society of Marine Artists, the American Impressionist Society, the Maryland Federation of Art, and the National Oil and Acrylic Painter’s Society. Megan is mentored by Marc R. Hanson, OPA and Ben Bauer.

Austin Reilly

Austin Reilly (they/he) is a Chicago visual artist who works with pens, oils, acrylics, and digitally. They primarily explore abstraction and figurative abstraction, remaining curious to how a peaceful reconciliation between the two can be presented. Their work has been shown at Esquina Chicago, Southwest Creative Studio, Happy Gallery, and at MANA Contemporary. They regularly publish and distribute zines containing drawings.

Erika Salvador

Erika Lynet Salvador, born and raised a Filipina, is an incoming first-year at Amherst College. Her visual art, usually using oil, watercolor, and ink, are featured or will soon be featured in the *82Review, the 3Elements Literary Review, the Jet Fuel Review, and the Madison Literary Journal for Literary Criticism. Additionally, she is the cover artist for select issues of the Remington Review and the Haunted Words Press Journal. She also explores film and phone photography from time to time and is an avid reader of free-verse poetry. See her art at @bodeganierika or https://linktr.ee/salvadorerika.

Crystal Shade

Crystal Shade is a talented artist based in Nashville known for her whimsical and playful pottery creations. She manages Gallery 100, a vibrant art collective space that supports local artists and fosters a sense of community. Crystal is also a dedicated member of the board of directors for the 100 Taylor Arts Market, promoting and supporting local artists in Nashville. Inspired by nature, her artwork often features adorable creatures, evoking joy and wonder. Crystal’s artistic journey showcases the power of embracing creativity at any stage in life and contributes to the thriving arts community in Nashville.

Ryo Kajitani

Ryo Kajitani works as both artist and queer art model in Tokyo, Japan. His identity as nonbinary and asexual enriches not only his presence as a model but also resonates throughout his artistic practice. During his time at Tama Art University (2010-2014), he specialized in oil-based woodcut printmaking. In the doctoral program (2016-2019), he studied under the late MOTOE Kunio (art historian, 1948-2019) and Nakamura Yutaka (cultural anthropologist). His research focused on implementing the ontological aesthetics method in exhibition spaces with the artistic activities therein and proposed tentative logical models based on Heidegger’s art theory. After graduating, he returned to work as an art model and graphic designer in Tokyo. His experience in art modeling and knowledge of woodblock printmaking techniques converge in his current photographic practice. His work combines analog photography and computational methods using Python libraries. Recent exhibitions and awards include the Montage Award at Meta Morph AI Film Awards, participation in “AI AI AI International Group Invitational” at WESSLING Contemporary (formerly Radian Gallery), and recognition at the Asian Digital Art Award FUKUOKA. He also uses his experience of being assaulted to provide international humanitarian aid and support orphans and others who wish to reintegrate into society.

Roger Camp

Roger Camp is the author of three photography books including the award winning Butterflies in Flight, Thames & Hudson, 2002. His documentary photography has been awarded the prestigious Leica Medal of Excellence. His work has appeared in numerous journals including The New England Review, North American Review and the New York Quarterly. He is represented by the Robin Rice Gallery, NY.

Christopher Woods

Christopher Woods is a writer and photographer who lives in Texas. His monologue show, Twelve from Texas, was performed in NYC by Equity Library Theatre. His poetry collection, Maybe Birds Would Carry It Away, is published by Kelsay Books.

Rachel Coyne

Rachel Coyne is a writer and painter from Lindstrom, Mn

Trevor Nichols

Eagle Scout Trevor Nichols has, for his entire life, been an avid consumer of fiction, fantasy, and art. Since he was little, he had dreamed of writing, drawing, and painting his own worlds for others to enjoy; to be remembered fondly for his work, and to make others feel the way he did. He became a Boyscout, so he could experience the outdoors, travel, and learn. He tried his hand in craft, music, writing, everything he could to find how to express himself and the things he imagined. All this to say that while he is only a learner in all that he does, his goal is to to hone himself, and give unto others the wonder he feels and has felt.

Edward Michael Supranowicz

Edward Michael Supranowicz is the grandson of Irish and Russian/Ukrainian immigrants. He grew up on a small farm in Appalachia. He has a grad background in painting and printmaking. Some of his artwork has recently or will soon appear in Fish Food, Streetlight, Another Chicago Magazine, Door Is A Jar, The Phoenix, and The Harvard Advocate. Edward is also a published poet.

Cynthia Yatchman

Cynthia Yatchman is an accomplished Seattle based painter and printmaker, whose career spans over 30 years. Her art celebrates the unification to be found in transformational dichotomies. Her work has been featured extensively throughout the Puget Sound region and beyond as well as in multiple publications.