Category Archives: SF Bay Area

‍Barbara Jane Reyes was born in Manila, Philippines, raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, and is the author of Gravities of Center (Arkipelago Books, 2003), Poeta en San Francisco (TinFish Press, 2005), Diwata (BOA Editions, Ltd., 2010), To Love as Aswang (Philippine American Writers and Artists, Inc., 2015), Invocation to Daughters (City Lights Publishing, 2017), Letters to a Young Brown Girl (BOA Editions, Ltd.,Continue reading “Barbara Jane Reyes”

Chun Yu, Ph.D. 俞淳博士 was born in China and grew up there. After graduating from Peking University 北京大学 with a B.S. and a M.S. in chemistry, she came to the United States to pursue her career in science. She graduated with a Ph.D. in biomaterials from Rutgers University. She was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard-MITContinue reading “Chun Yu”

‍Karla Brundage is a Bay Area based poet, activist, and educator with a passion for social justice. Born in Berkeley, California, Karla spent most of her childhood in Hawaii where she developed a deep love of nature. She is the founder of West Oakland to West Africa Poetry Exchange (WO2WA), which has facilitated cross-cultural exchangeContinue reading “Karla Brundage”

devorah major, San Francisco’s third Poet Laureate is an award-winning poet and fiction writer, a creative non-fiction writer, performer, editor, and part-time senior adjunct professor at California College of the Arts. She was poet-in-residence of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco for 28 years.  She has toured internationally in places such as Italy, Bosnia, Jamaica,Continue reading “devorah major”

‍James Cagney is the author of Black Steel Magnolias in the Hour of Chaos Theory (Nomadic Press, 2018), winner of the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award. His second book of poems Martian (Nomadic Press, 2021) was selected by Mark Bibbins, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Ladan Osman to receive the 2021 James Laughlin Award. A Cave Canem fellow, Cagney lives in Oakland, California.

‍Poet, performance artist, and photographer Jennifer Hasegawa grew up in Hilo, Hawai’i and lives in San Francisco, California. The manuscript for her debut poetry collection La Chica’s Field Guide to Banzai Living (2020) received the San Francisco Foundation’s Joseph Henry Jackson Literary Award and the collection itself was longlisted for The Believer Book Award in Poetry. In aContinue reading “Jennifer Hasegawa”

‍Jenny Qi is the author of Focal Point, winner of the 2020 Steel Toe Books Poetry Award. Her essays and poems have been published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, and elsewhere, and she has received fellowships and support from Tin House, Omnidawn, Kearny Street Workshop, and the San Francisco Writers Grotto. Born in Pennsylvania to Chinese immigrants, sheContinue reading “Jenny Qi”

‍Jason Bayani is the author of Locus (Omnidawn Publishing 2019) and Amulet (Write Bloody Publishing 2013). He’s an MFA graduate from Saint Mary’s College, a Kundiman fellow, and works as the artistic director for Kearny Street Workshop, the oldest multi-disciplinary Asian Pacific American arts organization in the country. His publishing credits include World Literature Today, BOAAT Journal,Continue reading “Jason Bayani”

‍Josiah Luis Alderete is a full blooded Pocho, Spanglish speaking poeta who has been an active part of la Area Bahia’s spoken word scene for over twenty years. He was a founding member of outspoken word group “The Molotov Mouths” and is the curator and host of the long running monthly Chicano/Latinx reading series Speaking Axolotl which happensContinue reading “Josiah Luis Alderete”