Our Team

Christiana Castillo is an educator, activist, urban gardener and writer. She holds an undergraduate degree from Wayne State University where she obtained an English major with a co-major in peace and conflict studies and resolution. Christiana serves as a board member for the Michigan Coalition for Human Rights. She recently finished writing a bilingual children’s book titled A Town Called Hope, which focuses on community and environmental justice. Most of her teachings focus on social justice and peace and conflict resolution. In her free time she enjoys making collages, doodling and reading. She loves her cats and all things sunflowers.

Franny Choi is the author of the collection Floating, Brilliant, Gone (Write Bloody Publishing, 2014) and the chapbook Death by Sex Machine (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2017). She has received awards and fellowships from the Poetry Foundation, Kundiman, and the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts. Her work has appeared in Poetry Magazine, the Poetry Review, Indiana Review, and elsewhere. She is an MFA candidate at the University of Michigan, a Project VOICE teaching artist, and a member of the Dark Noise Collective.

Kelly Fordon’s work has appeared in The Florida Review, The Kenyon Review (KRO), Rattle and various other journals. Her novel-in-stories, Garden for the Blind, was chosen as a Michigan Notable Book, an Indiefab Finalist and a Midwest Book Award Finalist, among others. She is the author of three award-winning poetry chapbooks. On the Street Where We Live, a one-act play adapted from her poetry was chosen for the 2018 Dream Up Festival in New York. Her first full-length poetry collection will be published by Kattywompus Press in 2019. She teaches at the College for Creative Studies and InsideOut Literary Arts in Detroit. www.kellyfordon.com.

Detroit Music Award winning singer/songwriter Audra Kubat has released 6 albums to critical acclaim in a career that spans over 20 years. A composer, performer, educator, and Wayne State University alumni, Kubat’s work has earned her a place in the community as a resource for empowerment through songwriting and music. Her methods of composition articulate grace and uncover hidden places that defy easy categorization. Kubat has created programming for a number of educational projects, including songwriting workshops for DPS, storytelling circles for Square One Education Network, and performance and lyric workshops with Girls Rock Detroit. Currently she is teaching with InsideOut Literary Arts, Living Arts Detroit, Wolf Trap, and the Detroit Institute for Music Education.

John Rybicki was born and raised in Detroit. He is the author of the poetry collections, We Bed Down Into Water, When All the World is Old, Traveling at High Speeds, and When All the World is Old. His poems have appeared in Poetry, Ploughshares, American Poetry Review, Ecotone, and the Paris Review, among many others, and have been reprinted in Best American Poetry and The Pushcart Prize Anthology. He teaches poetry writing in various Detroit high schools through InsideOut Literary Arts; he also works with ‘Wings of Hope’ Hospice teaching poetry to children who have been through a trauma or loss. Holy work. His children have been published in Time Magazine for Kids, Skipping Stones, the North American Review, the Pushcart Prize Anthology, and others. (photo credit:  Savannah Dooley)

Megan Stockton is a poet and publisher living in Detroit, Michigan. She is the current editor-in-chief of BathHouse Journal, a member of Problem Press, and editor at Weekday Journal. Her writing has been published by Publication Studio, Monster House Press, BigBig Wednesday, Bearings: Works About Boundaries, Flint Magazine, and A Plume Journal. She recently graduated with an M.A. in Creative Writing from EMU, and currently facilitates a poetry workshop at the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility.

Benjamin Earl Turner is a writer, performer, and educator from the suburbs of Oakland, California. After graduating from Wiley College with two National titles in college competitive Forensics (Speech and Debate) Benjamin went on to attend Wayne State University and received a Masters degree in English, with a focus in Creative Writing and African Diasporic Literature. He was the editor of the Wayne Literary Review in 2018 and is currently a Composition and Rhetoric Instructor at Wayne State. His creative mediums of choice include poetry, creative non-fiction, songwriting, flash fiction, and screenwriting. He also has a fire SoundCloud.