THE POETRY QUESTION: TPQ20

Chris and Courtney sit down with Charles K. Carter, author of Salem Revisited (WordTech Poetry), to talk about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Charles K. Carter is a queer poet and educator from Iowa. He shares his home with his artist husband and their spoiled pets. He enjoys film, yoga, and live music. Melissa Etheridge is his ultimate obsession. Carter has an MA in creative writing wi...

Chris sits down with Alan Chazaro, author of Piñata Theory and This Isn't a Frank Ocean Cover Album (Black Lawrence Press), to talk about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! Alan Chazaro's Website Bio: I write about things. After 10 years working as a public high school teacher in Louisiana, Massachusetts, and California, I decided to pursue my creative interests more seriously and have been...

Courtney and Chris sit down with Hannah Cohen, author of Year of the Scapegoat (coming Spring of '22 from Glass Poetry), to talk about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! Hannah Cohen resides in Virginia with her two cats. She's a graduate of the Queens University of Charlotte MFA program. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks: YEAR OF THE SCAPEGOAT (Glass Poetry Press, 2022) and BAD ANAT...

Chris sits down with Patrick Roche, author of A Socially Acceptable Breakdown (Button Poetry), for a one-on-one conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Patrick Roche (he/him) is an award-winning poet, performer, mental health advocate, and Carly Rae Jepsen enthusiast from New Jersey. Videos of Patrick’s work have amassed over 9.5 million views on YouTube, making him one of the...

Chris and Courtney sit down with Ashley Elizabeth, author of You Were Supposed to be a Friend (Nightengale & Sparrow), for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Ashley Elizabeth (she/her) is a writing consultant, teacher, and poet. Her works have appeared in SWWIM, Rigorous, and Kahini Quarterly, among others. Her chapbook, you were supposed to be a friend, is available fr...

Chris sits down for a one-on-one conversation with Taylor Byas, author of Bloodwarm (Variant Lit), for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! Taylor Byas is a Black poet and essayist. Originally from Chicago, she moved to Alabama for six years, where she received both her Bachelor’s degree in English and her Master’s degree in English (Creative Writing concentration) from th...

Join Courtney and Chris Margolin for a sit down with DeMisty D. Bellinger, author of Peculiar Heritage (Mason Jar Press), for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! DeMisty D. Bellinger is the author of the poetry collections Rubbing Elbows (Finishing Line Press, 2017) and Peculiar Heritage (Mason Jar Press, 2021), and the forthcoming novel New to Liberty (Unnamed Press, 202...

Chris sits down for a one-on-one conversation with Jose Hernandez Diaz on passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Jose Hernandez Diaz is a 2017 NEA Poetry Fellow. He is the author of a collection of prose poems: The Fire Eater (Texas Review Press, 2020). He holds degrees in English and Creative Writing from UC Berkeley and Antioch University Los Angeles. His work appears in The American Poetry R...

Courtney & Chris Margolin sit down with Rita Mookerjee of Honey Literary to discuss all things passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Rita Mookerjee is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Women's and Gender Studies Program at Iowa State University. Her research interests include postcolonial women's literature, food studies, and queer theory. She holds a PhD in Literature from Florida State...

Chris Margolin sits down one-on-one with Ariana Brown for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  ARIANA BROWN is a Black Mexican American poet with ten years of experience writing, performing, and teaching poetry. She offers a list of services for college events, poetry slams, and local organizations. Her work focuses on Black relationality, queer kinship, and imagining a w...

Courtney and Chris Margolin sit down with Chen Chen for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and Poetry. They might also talk about Russian literature, Buffy, and the horrors of getting sucked down a mall escalator. This is quite the conversation! 陳琛 / Chen Chen’s second book of poetry, Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency, is forthcoming from BOA Editions in Sept. 20...

Courtney and Chris sit down with Dare Williams for a conversation about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Dare Williams: A 2019 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellow, Dare Williams is a Queer HIV-positive poet, artist, rooted in Southern California. He has received fellowships from John Ashbury Home School and The Frost Place. He is a co-producer of the reading series Word of Mouth which rais...

Chris and Courtney sit down with Deesha Philyaw to talk about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Deesha Philyaw’s debut short story collection, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, won the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the 2020/2021 Story Prize, and the 2020 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction....

Chris sits down for a one-on-one conversation with Sarah Kersey about passions, process, pitfalls, and Poetry! Sarah Kersey is a poet and x-ray tech from New Jersey. Her work has appeared, or is forthcoming, in The Hellebore, Mortar Magazine, Ghost City Review, The Harpoon Review, and elsewhere. She is an Associate Editor of South Florida Poetry Journal. She tweets @sk__poet.

Chris and Courtney sit down with Denzel Scott to discuss passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry! Denzel Xavier Scott earned his BA in English from the University of Chicago and received his Writing MFA at Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) in his hometown of Savannah, GA. His works appear in Spillway, Decomp, Euphony Journal, and Blacklight Magazine of the University of Chicago, Bombay Gin...

Chris sits solo with Todd Dillard to discuss passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  Todd Dillard grew up in Houston, Texas, completing his undergraduate degree at the University of Houston with a concentration in creative writing and poetry. From there, he moved to New York to study in the creative writing program at Sarah Lawrence College, where he received his MFA in poetry in 2008. After liv...

Courtney and Chris sit down with George Abraham, author of Birthright (Button Poetry), to talk about passions, process, pitfalls, and poetry!  George Abraham is a Palestinian American poet and writer from Jacksonville, FL. Their debut poetry collection Birthright (Button Poetry, 2020) won the Arab American Book Award and the Big Other Book Award in Poetry, was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Aw...

Chris sits down for a one-on-one with Elizabeth Horan. Elisabeth Horan is a poet, mother, and small press publisher living in the wilds of Vermont. She is the author of numerous poetry chapbooks and collections, and the Editor-In-Chief of Animal Heart Press. Elisabeth is passionate about discovering new voices and mentoring emerging poets. She is also a fierce advocate for those impacted by mental...

Chris and Courtney sit down with Danez Smith to talk about Passion, Process, Pitfalls, and Poetry!  Danez Smith is a Black, Queer, Poz writer & performer from St. Paul, MN. Danez is the author of “Homie” (Graywolf Press, 2020), "Don’t Call Us Dead" (Graywolf Press, 2017), winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection, the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award, and a finalist for the National Book Awa...

Courtney sits down with the legendary Ebony Stewart for a special one-on-one edition of TPQ20 Ebony Stewart is an international touring poet and performance artist. Her work speaks to the black experience, with emphasis on gender, sexuality, womanhood, and race, with the hopes to be relatable, remove shame, heal minds, encourage dialogue, and inspire folks in marginalized communities. As one of th...

Courtney and Chris Margolin sit down with Sam Herschel Wein to talk about Passions, Process, Pitfalls, and Poetry.  Sam Herschel Wein (pronouns: he/they) is a lollygagging plum of a poet who specializes in perpetual frolicking. They are an MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. Their first chapbook, Fruit Mansion (Split Lip Press, 2017) was selected as the winner of the...