OUR EDITORIAL BOARD
A hearing impaired writer and artist adopted in Luxembourg, Kelly Sargent is an awardwinning author of two memoirs in verse, a haiku and senryu poetry collection, and a children’s storybook. Recent honors include: Firebird Book Award winner, The Rash Award in Poetry finalist, Eric Hoffer Award nominee, Touchstone Award for Individual Poems nominee, and Best of the Net nominee. Her other works have appeared in more than eighty literary journals. She also serves as the creative nonfiction editor of TheBookendsReview. Visit www.kellysargent.com to learn more about her.
K.D. Zwierz is a lecturer, musician and poet. His poetry was recently featured in the anthology Ukraine in the work of international poets (Literary Waves). His writing explores themes of displacement, cultural identity and historical relativism, explored through the analysis of his own experiences growing up in a migrant farming community. Of PolishItalian descent, he lives and writes between Croatia, Kuwait and the UK.
Colby Flade (he/him) is a queer writer, artist, avid drinker of coffee, and student based in Chicago. He is the author of TheSmelloftheLightBlueHouseinSummertime (2021), Menthol(2022), FearHome(Oyez Review, Vol. 49, 2022), ShortSweetSimple:LovePoems (Bottlecap Press, 2022), IgnisFatuus(Beyond Words Literary Magazine, Issue 35, 2023) and TheFly&Odor(Beyond Words Press, 2023). Colby’s work can be found online, at bookshops like This Old Book in Grayslake, Illinois & The Book Teller in Whitewater, Wisconsin, and elsewhere. Flade attended DePaul University, studying Writing, Rhetoric & Discourse, and is currently pursuing a degree in Early Childhood Education. Find him on Instagram @theflade and on www.theflade.com
Noah Evan Wilson is a writer and musician based in New York City. His stories have been published in Beyond Words, Dreamers Creative Writing Magazine, and Prime Number Magazine, among others, as well as the anthology, TenWaystheAnimalsWillSaveUs , from Retreat West Books. Noah is currently an MFA candidate at Rutgers University-Newark. His latest record, The View fromtheGround – EP , is now available on all major streaming platforms.
Candi Martin is a Creative Writing tutor and published writer/editor who writes on social equality and our roots in this world. She holds MA Creative Writing and Wellbeing from Teesside University and has always written for her own wellbeing. She can usually found listening to BBC6 music with a huge cup of tea. IG: @candi_says
Brian "Brie" Sheridan is a writer and editor existing on the East Coast. They are currently trying to publish their first chapbook. In their free time, the enjoy playing nostalgic video games, planning out tattoos, and drag.
Roberta Laurie is the author of Weaving a Malawi Sunrise. She holds an MA in Environmental Education and Communication and teaches in the Bachelor of Communication Studies program at MacEwan University. Roberta writes about writing,
nature, sustainability, and sustainability communication. She is currently writing a memoir inspired by a box of letters left behind by her father.
deb Ewing writes, paints, and screams at the stars because the world is still screwed up. She improves what she can with music collaboration, peer-review at Consilience Poetry Journal, or designing books for Igneus Press. Follow @DebsValidation on X and Instagram. Read her self-distractions at FolkWorks.org and JerryJazzMusician.com.
Lachlan McGregor is a queer Sydney-based writer. Their poetry and fiction has featured in BeyondWords , BeyondQueerWords , and HalfandOne . Lachie traipses the globe playing queer rugby and enjoys petting neighbourhood felines. They have just completed their Masters of Creative Writing at Sydney University and enjoy monthly meetups with a brilliant writing group.
Erin Courville is a perpetual student and avid reader from Vermont. Erin has edited for The IsisLiteraryMagazine at the University of Oxford, In SumMagazine , and Parlor Tricks Literary Magazine at Williams College. She has acted as Editor in Chief for Parlor Tricks , and has published poetry with BeyondWords , Mag20/20 , ParlorTricks , and local newspapers.
Joseph Cusi Tian-Delamerced is a Filipino writer based in Connecticut with a background in medicine, education, and storytelling. He has won short story awards for pieces published in LIGHT , CreationMagazine , and BeyondWordsMagazine . You can find more scattered thoughts he weaves together on Instagram (@wordsbyjosephctd) and on Medium (medium.com/@joseph.ctd).
WRITERS
Nancy Hendrickson is the author of magazines, books, and poetry. She believes all words begin with poetic words.
Jeremy Radin is a writer and actor. His poems have appeared (or are forthcoming) in Poema-Day , Ploughshares , The Colorado Review , Crazyhorse , The Sun , Only Poems , and elsewhere, and he is the author of three collections of poetry:BellyGod(Orison Books, forthcoming 2026, selected by Ellen Bass), DearSal(Not A Cult, 2022), SlowDancewith Sasquatch(Write Bloody Publishing, 2012). Follow him @germyradin
Joshua Rosen is a writer based in Cleveland, Ohio.His work focuses on poetry, flash fiction, and short stories that explore our place in the world around us. When Josh isn’t writing, he enjoys hiking and spending time in nature with his wife and son.
Ji Hyo Kim is a high school student from Seoul, South Korea. As a fledgling writer, she seeks to connect with people through her poetry. Her work has been recognized by the New YorkTimesand the National Council of Teachers of English and has been published in the EunoiaReview
Lesley Grand is an essayist, short story writer and retired tv news reporter living with her husband and very shaggy dog in New York City.
Dick Altman writes in the high, thin, magical air of Santa Fe, NM, where, at 7,000 feet, reality and imagination often blur. He is published in SantaFeLiteraryReview , AmericanJournal ofPoetry , FredericksburgLiteraryReview , FoliateOak , LandingZone , CathexisNorthwest Press , Humana Obscura , Haunted WatersPress , SplitRockReview , The RavensPerch , BeyondWords,NewVerseNews , WinglessDreamer , Blueline , SkyIslandJournal and others here and abroad. His work also appears in the first edition of The New Mexico AnthologyofPoetry , published by the New Mexico Museum Press. Pushcart Prize nominee and poetry winner of Santa Fe New Mexican’s annual literary competition, he has authored some 250 poems, published on four continents.
Hal M. Bogotch is a poet living in Southern California. His poems have appeared in Rattle , SierraNevadaReview , and TheLucidStone , as well as in Side-EyeontheApocalypse:An AnthologyofProseandPoetry . A poem of his will soon be published in Moonstone Arts Center’s 29th Annual Poetry Ink. Blog: https://hal123pov.wordpress.com/
Lina Buividavičiūtė was born on May 14, 1986. She is a poet and literary critic. Lina is author of two poetry books in the Lithuanian language. Her poetry is published in Matter , Masters andProversePoetryPrizeanthologies, and the magazines:DrunkMonkeys,BeyondWords , The Dewdrop , The Limit Experience , Beyond Queer Words , Maudlin House , Cathexis NorthwestPress , PoetryOnline , RedNoiseCollective , SadGirlsDiaries, as well as the
Versopolis poetry platform. Upcoming publications include New Millennium Writings , CathexisNorthwestPress , RedNoiseCollective , TheStardustReviewand BeyondWords .
Melissa Alipalo is a writer, teacher, and international development consultant based in Maine, U.S.A.. She lived for nearly 20 years in the Philippines before former President Rodrigo Duterte’s violent regime drove them to leave for their safety. She is still unpacking their decision to leave—all its regrets but also reliefs.
Jade Rosina McCutcheon’s poetry has been published in Australian, German and American poetry journals. She has been awarded the Kay Snow Award (Oregon Willamette Writers) and honorary mentions from the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. Jade’s chapbooks SMALLFEATHERand thetossingdreamare published by Finishing Line Press, Kentucky USA. She has been awarded three artist-in-residencies with the Salem Arts Association and Dorland Mountain Arts, California. Jade holds a PhD from the University of Melbourne.
Aishani Sil (she/her) is a software engineer who enjoys writing and other artistic pursuits in her free time.
Michael Anthony Ranfone was born up north, raised in Florida, and writes now from South Carolina. His fiction deals in hard choices, soft regrets, and the places people go to disappear.
Sharalyn Barg grew up in rural British Columbia, Canada, and studied writing at the University of Calgary.
Climbing Sun is a world traveler, bodysurfer, poet, teacher, engineer, and building designer. He taught poetry in California schools for over two decades and has authored two chapbooks plus a novel. His writings are an ongoing attempt to integrate the earthly, human, and spirit realms. He lives in Florida, maintains a writing blog, and holds a Bachelor of Civil Engineering.
Shannon Swearingen Gabriel is a professional copy editor by day, a mother around the clock, and a scribbler of poems whenever possible. Originally from Nashville, she now lives in the Chicago suburbs, where she enjoys visiting the area’s many fantastic restaurants, coffee shops, and vinyl record stores. Her work has been published in (most recently) The SouthernQuilland LastLeavesMagazine , and her debut chapbook, EmergencyExits , has just been published with Boats Against the Current. Find her at shannongabriel.com and on Instagram @thatmompoet.
Carisa Coburn Pineda is from Costa Rica and the United States. She received her undergraduate degree from Occidental College and her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of Maryland, College Park. She lives in Burke, VA with her husband and their children. She writes about language, culture, and loss.
Kristina Wright's creative non-fiction and poetry have appeared in various journals, including Hippocampus , LiteraryMama , Brain , Child magazine , The Worcester Review , Amoskeag , and TheMidwest Quarterly She is an English professor at Southern New Hampshire University, where she teaches creative writing and literature.
VISUAL ARTISTS
Cover art by Mario Loprete. Mario is an Italian artist who has distinguished himself in the contemporary art scene through innovative use of materials and a unique vision of urban art. His work lies at the crossroads of painting and sculpture, exploring themes of memory, identity, and urban transformation. Loprete uses raw materials like cement and plaster to create works that evoke urban architectural structures. This choice is not only aesthetic but also conceptual: cement, with its hardness and permanence, becomes a symbol of collective and personal memory, fixing the traces of our urban existence over time. Plaster, on the other hand, with its fragility, represents the vulnerability and transience of human life and experiences. One of the distinctive features of Loprete's work is his ability to transform everyday and banal objects into meaningful works of art. His pieces often incorporate elements of graffiti, echoing street art and the ephemeral messages that populate cities. However, through the artistic process, these messages are fixed and immortalized, creating a dialogue between the ephemeral and the permanent.
Liz Bajjalieh, Well,ITried.Liz is a disabled queer and non-binary artist and poet living in Ojibwe Land (sometimes called Chicago). Also mixed-race with Palestinian heritage, their art carries themes of grief, rebirth, and seeking impossible hope in painful times. Their work has appeared in the Chicago Collage Community's "Community Through Collage" exhibit and The Fulton Street Collective's "The Weird and the Wonderful."
Dafna Tal, Untitled,fromtheseriesSphere(2023); Untitled,fromtheseriesCastingSand (2025), unmanipulated documentary photographs. Driven by a long-standing curiosity about human behavior, Dafna Tal's creative process blends documentary principles with contemporary and conceptual art. Her practice incorporates video, photography, installation, and sculpture, often involving collaboration with diverse communities and natural environments. Tal began her artistic career studying theater and sculpture in Ireland before pursuing photography at the International Center of Photography in New York (ICP). She furthered her education in the European Diploma for Cultural Project Management program at the Association Marcel Hicter in Finland, Cyprus, and Greece. Her works have been exhibited internationally, including at the Royal Scottish Academy of Art (Edinburgh, UK), Visa pour L’Image (Perpignan, France), Copenhagen Photo Festival (Denmark), Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre (Sydney, Australia), and Lagos Photo Festival (Nigeria). Website: www.dafnatal.com; Instagram: @dafna_tal_studio
Sami Cave, Goat . Sami is an award-winning artist based in Texas, working primarily in acrylic and watercolor. Her paintings often feature animals and whimsical figures, designed to bring a sense of peace, playfulness, and inspiration. https://www.peacefulpainting.net/
Lindy Giusta, Untitled;MelancholyMadness . Lindy is a passionate, queer Brooklyn-based outsider mixed media artist. Their work has been featured in Peatsmoke , LIbreLit , Weird LitMagand other upcoming publications.
Annie Wood, da vedere (to see) Annie is a Los Angeles born actress, writer and internationally exhibited award-winning artist whose work explores the space between vulnerability and strength, between the real and the imagined. Known for her bold, mixedmedia figurative paintings, Wood invites viewers into a world where emotion lives on the surface. Each figure she creates feels raw, real, and alive—sometimes fragile, always powerful. anniewood.com; Instagram: @artistanniewood
Miklos Legrady is a visual artist and a critical writer. Like the Energizer Bunny, Legrady just keeps on going and going. Website: legrady.com, contact info legrady@me.com.
Michelle Spiziri, Whimsical As a painter, Michelle is interested in what happens when color, form, movement, and shape interact with each other forming their own dialogue. Painting for her is as much about self-iscovery as it is about visual space. She paints in response to what her subconscious mind makes room for. She is using art to escape from old patterns towards a freedom of undeniable love of the self. She wants all emotions and all parts to be present. She paints to make a place for all the parts of herself that seek expression, even if she doesn’t want to see or love all the parts that make herself.
Kat Correro, Lucy . Kat is a Louisiana-based visual artist and poet exploring themes of emotion, memory, and identity. Her work blends vibrant acrylic textures with metaphorrich language, often echoing personal experiences of love, loss, and healing. She is the creator behind Kataclysmic Kreations and shares her work at kataclysmickreations.com.
LUSMERLIN, Therulesofnature , Acrylic on canvas, 28x28 in. Bold like the streets of Santo Domingo, where she grew up, LUSMERLIN is a nationally exhibiting multidisciplinary artist, practicing in Greater Baltimore and Philadelphia. She has a professional background as a chemical engineer in textile and cement manufacturing. LUSMERLIN’s practice explores her own womanhood and identity: the presence of the body in space; the richness and baggage of her complex heritage-African, Arab, Spanish, Taino-and her metamorphic immigration experience since moving to the U.S. in 2016. Her media include abstract paintings, pastel, installations, photography and impromptu performances full of whim and force. LUSMERLIN is a 2024 Philadelphia Mural Arts Fellow, a 2025 Sondheim Prize semifinalist, and a grant recipient from the Baltimore Office for Promotion of the Arts, and the Frederick Arts Council. Her literary work has been published in multiple books and magazines in Puerto Rico, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic. Beyond art, LUSMERLIN is deeply committed to community engagement, volunteering with organizations that support immigrants, disadvantaged groups, and arts advocacy.
gdw3 (a.k.a. Gordon Wimpress), FlightPlan . gdw3 has been making abstract art for over two decades. He uses digital tools in unique and unusual ways, creating images that are one-of-a-kind, colorful (or not), weird, cool, different, and fun. gdw3's images have appeared in gallery shows, album covers, websites, videos, and on the walls of discerning collectors.
Jingwen Liu, 缠 . Jingwen Liu is a visual artist from China, currently based in New York City. She is pursuing a BFA in Digital Photography and Imaging at NYU Tisch School of the Arts.
Drawing from both Eastern and Western visual languages, her work explores themes of memory, identity, and the evolving relationship between technology and the human experience. Through photography, digital media, and conceptual storytelling, Liu investigates the boundaries between the real and the imagined, often incorporating personal and cultural narratives into her practice.
Paula Praeger, HoldOn Paula is an artist and a writer. Her prints have been exhibited in the United States and abroad and she has contributed artwork to literary magazines. Her poems were published in Hindsight , Cancer , Months to Years , Close Up , Visible Ink Anthologies , the SadGirlsCluband HumansoftheWorldblogs.
Rosa Silver, SheisResourceFull Born and raised in Manhattan, now living in Portland Oregon. Rosa has exhibited internationally for decades, last year in Assisi Italy, the home of St Francis of Assisi and a global peace center. Locally, she created an installation using water from the nearby Willamette River, also a superfund site. A multidisciplinary artist with an MFA in metal-smithing and years of experience creating installations, her current focus is on watercolor with printmaking. She wears many hats - as a curator, radio personality, student of Kabbalah, and a certified facilitator of a mindfulness practice called The Work of Byron Katie. Her focus is on healing and creating connection. She also studies various forms of healing trauma and volunteers on a helpline. Website: rosasilver.com
Carol Schoder,ComingorGoing?Carol is a Chicago area writer and visual artist. Her poetry has been featured in PoetrySuperhighwayand StreetcakeMagazine Carol’s collage, SelfPortraitwithPear, is included in Sonic Boom’s 2025 World Collage Day collection and her visual poetry was featured in Sonic Boom’s Vispo 2025. She enjoys painting, photography and creating one-of-a-kind artist books.
Alexander Goldberg, HolyMountain . Alexander is a visual artist who works primarily with acrylics and ink, occasionally incorporating hybrid digital elements. More of his work can be found at www.alexgoldbergart.com
Eszter Takacs is a visual artist, poet, educator and supportive housing assistant living in Denver. She is a PhD candidate of creative writing and is investigating the sociocultural impact of the #freebritney movement through the lens of docu-poetics. She is the author of the chapbooks The Miraculous Hysterial (H_NGM_N Books) and Together We Will Talk Right Down to Earth (The New Megaphone).
Nathaniel Michael, ArchitraveFlute . Nathaniel lives in Flowery Branch, GA with his wife, Nicole, and daughter, Thea. He works in a family reconciliation program, Eagle Ranch, alongside his family. He practices writing and photography in his free time.
Kevin Bodniza, RidetheSnake , 2023, 48x40 in, Mixed Media on Canvas Kevin, a self-taught artist born in South Florida, has always approached art instinctually, creating without formal training. Using collage as his medium, he constructs textured worlds that reflect the chaos and beauty of life. His work is raw and unapologetic, evoking emotions that range from joy to discomfort. In 2024, Kevin held his first solo exhibition at his studio in Miami Shores, a milestone in his emerging artist career. Kevin is driven by the hope of sharing his
work on a larger scale. His art challenges viewers to question their feelings, sparking conversations that linger. Unbound by convention, Kevin embraces creativity as the fullest expression of existence and aspires to grow his artistic footprint in the years to come.
Rachel Mulder, YourMirrorisHeretoHelp Rachel was born in rural Wisconsin and when she was small she spent a lot of time sitting in the grass staring, obsessing about animals, watching cartoons and peeling her skin off. She lives in Portland, Oregon, where her current obsession is making gel pen drawings that masquerade as someone's next sci-fi novel cover, milked from inside the paper and oozing from her brain. Residual effects from earning her BFA in Printmaking at Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design in 2007 inspire her to vacillate between rigidity and intuition in her media of choice, which includes drawing with a typewriter, experimental cyanotypes, water-soluble graphite, pen and ink, and even her wet hair in the shower.
Annie Guldberg, YouWillKnowWhenYouGetThere . Annie is an oil painter based out of southern Iowa. Her pieces reflect a mixture of real places and the dream world. She creates out of her home studio, and enjoys life with her husband and two sons.
Laurel Oswald Clark, resident of New Jersey, began her fine art studies in 1967. She is a teacher and a full time painter
Karin Reimondos, The Power of Luck Karin is freelance photographer, emerging international writer, and horse breeder, living on a farm in Sweden with her Welsh Springer Spaniels, Ben, Billy and Mickey. Karin writes poetry and fiction, and has poems forthcoming in Poet'sChoiceand photography forthcoming in FusionArtand L'EspritLiteraryReview
Candice Louisa Daquin, Lung . Candice Louisa Daquin is a mixed-race immigrant of Egyptian/French heritage. She is a trauma therapist who edits for RawEarthInkand Queer Inkas well as ThePineConeReview , ParchamLiteraryMagazineand TintJournal
Michael Kunzinger, AThread Michael Kunzinger took up photography as a teenager on Virginia's Middle Peninsula, drawing inspiration for his work from the waters of his home area. His work explores art in nature, with emphasis on that created by water. He has been featured in numerous solo shows, exhibits, and publications, including the Quick Center for the Arts (NY) and others. IG: @michaelkunzinger; Website: mfkunzinger.wixsite.com/home
Kat Barbieri, PinkPlacidity Kat is a fine art photographer who lives and works in Mount Dora, Florida. Her work focuses on themes of intimacy, personal connection, the domestic space and narrative storytelling. Kat graduated with her Bachelors of Fine Arts in Photography at the Ringling College of Art and Design in May 2022 and has graduated with her Masters of Fine Arts in Photography at the Savannah College of Art and Design in May 2025. Kat plans to become an educator.
Eunice Oladeji, Partsand(W)holes Eunice is a medical doctor, public health professional and a self-taught artist with a leaning towards photography and mixed media abstract art.
Aleksandra Scepanovic, The Sundered ; In Between Aleksandra is a New York sculptor whose work explores the human condition through fragmented forms, celebrating wholeness amidst fracture and transformation. Her sculptures emerge from lived dislocation from a childhood in then-Yugoslavia, through the surreal terrain of war, to quiet reintegration across continents. Today, she works between Woodstock and Brooklyn, sculpting figures that resist closure and invite reflection
