Julia Cohen, "Freak Lip" w/ Author Panel Reading

Julia Cohen is the author of I Was Not Born (Noemi Press, 2014), a collection of lyric essays, which was translated into German and released by Literaturverlag Droschl. She’s also written two books of poetry, Collateral Light (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2014) and Triggermoon Triggermoon (BLP, 2011). Her nonfiction and poetry appear in issues of The Georgia Review, Southeast Review, The New England Review, Fugue, Heavy Feather Review, Boston Review, and BOMB. She is the Director of Writing Across the Curriculum at Rocky Mountain College of Art & Design, where she teaches creative writing, literature, and composition.

Cecily Chen is a writer and translator from Beijing. She is currently completing her PhD in English at the University of Chicago, where she works on experimental Asian American literature and visual culture. Most recently, she is the translator of Bed by Wu Ang, out from Beautiful Days Press.

Jose-Luis Moctezuma is a Xicano poet based in Chicago. He is the author of Place-Discipline (Omnidawn, 2018) and Black Box Syndrome (Omnidawn, 2023). He is an Assistant Professor of Writing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC).

Kathleen Rooney is the nationally bestselling author of Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk, as well as Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey and From Dust to Stardust. She has won the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize from Poetry magazine and the Adam Morgan Literary Citizen Award from the Chicago Review of Books. Kathleen’s criticism can be found in The New York Times, the Star Tribune (Minneapolis), The Brooklyn Rail, Chicago magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and beyond. She lives in Chicago with her spouse, the writer Martin Seay, and teaches English and creative writing at DePaul University.

Shayne Terry is the author of Leave: A Postpartum Account. Her work has appeared in CRAFT, Electric Literature, TriQuarterly, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and elsewhere, and her story "The Rock Is Not a Rock" was named a distinguished story of 2024 by The Best American Short Stories. She has been selected for workshops and residencies at Bread Loaf, Tin House, and the Vermont Studio Center. She splits her time between Rockford, Illinois, and Brooklyn, New York.