The Maynard
Spring 2020

Author Biographies

John Barton

John Barton’s twenty-six books include Polari (Goose Lane Editions, 2014) and We Are Not Avatars: Essays, Memoirs, Manifestos (Palimpsest Press, 2019). Forthcoming fall 2020: Lost Family: A Memoir (Signal Editions) and The Essential Derk Wynand (The Porcupine’s Quill). He lives in Victoria, BC, where he’s poet laureate.

Lesley Battler

Lesley Battler is the author of Endangered Hydrocarbons (BookThug, 2015). Her poetry has been anthologized in The Best Canadian Poetry 2015 and BAX: Best American Experimental Writing 2016. She currently works as a freelance writer and researcher in Edmonton, Alberta.

Jenny Berkel

Jenny Berkel is a singer-songwriter and poet from rural Ontario. In between playing concerts, she writes, teaches English, and works at the library. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in the Literary Review of Canada, Hart House Review, and long con magazine, among others.

Chris Checkwitch

Chris Checkwitch is a recent graduate of University of Victoria, where he majored in both English and molecular biology. Poetry has become his predominant means of exploring the philosophical intricacies arising at the intersection of these two fields. Born and raised in Calgary, Alberta, he currently lives in Victoria.

Jessica Covil

Jessica Covil is a PhD candidate in English at Duke University, pursuing Graduate Certificates in African and African American Studies and Feminist Studies. Broadly, her poems explore family, sisterhood, trauma, hope, sex, and politics. Her work has appeared in SWWIM Every Day, Whale Road Review, and Rise Up Review.

Stephanie Yue Duhem

Stephanie Yue Duhem is a 1.5 generation Chinese-American poet and educator. Her work appears in Lunch Ticket, PANK, and Radar Poetry, among others. She is also the author of a picture book, Robby and the Ice Cream Truck (Blurb, 2019). She is online @academoiselle (Twitter and Instagram) and at www.sydpoetry.com.

griffin epstein

griffin epstein is a non-binary white settler, working in education and mental health in Tkaronto. They have academic publications in Social Identities and Disability Studies Quarterly, and poetry in Grain Magazine, Rkvry Quarterly Literary Review, and Plenitude Magazine. They play music in SPOILS and make videogames with shruken studios.

Lawrence Feuchtwanger

Lawrence Feuchtwanger is the author of the full-length collection Refugee Song (Signature Editions, 2014) which was longlisted for The Writer’s Studio (Simon Fraser University) First Book Competition (2010). His poetry has been published in Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine. He lives on Gabriola Island, where he is working on a novella.

Robbie Gamble

Robbie Gamble’s work appears in Poet Lore, RHINO, and Rust + Moth. He was the winner of the 2017 Carve Magazine Poetry Contest. He works as a nurse practitioner caring for homeless people in Boston, Massachusetts.

Danielle Hanson

Danielle Hanson (daniellejhanson.com) is the author of Fraying Edge of Sky (Codhill Press, 2018) and Ambushing Water (Brick Road Poetry Press, 2017). In 2018, her work was a Finalist for the Georgia Author of the Year Award. She is poetry editor for Doubleback Books, and on staff at Atlanta Review.

Jen Karetnick

Jen Karetnick is the author of ten poetry collections, including Hunger Until It's Pain (Salmon Poetry, spring 2023) and The Burning Where Breath Used to Be (David Robert Books, August 2020). Her work appears in Barrow Street, The Comstock Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Terrain, and elsewhere. See more at jkaretnick.com.

Eleanor Kedney

Eleanor Kedney is the author of the full-length poetry collection Between the Earth and Sky (C&R Press, 2020) and the chapbook The Offering (Liquid Light Press, 2016). Kedney is the founder of the Tucson branch of the New York-based Writers Studio, and served as the director for ten years. www.eleanorkedney.com.

Erin Kirsh

Erin Kirsh is a writer and performer living in Vancouver. A Pushcart Prize nominee, her work has appeared in The Malahat Review, Arc Poetry Magazine, EVENT, and Geist. Visit her at www.erinkirsh.com or follow her on Twitter @kirshwords.

Hege A. Jakobsen Lepri

Hege A. Jakobsen Lepri is a Norwegian-Canadian translator and writer. Primarily a prose writer, her poetry has appeared in untethered, PRISM international, Haiku Journal, and Watch your Head. For more information: www.hegeajlepri.ca.

Varian Loo

Varian Loo was born in the Nation of Brunei and immigrated to Vancouver, British Columbia in 1981. He received a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art + Design in 2007. Varian is a painter, sculptor, and for a decade now, has been a professional tattoo artist.

Sarah Lyons-Lin

Sarah Lyons-Lin works as a braillist and loves the Midwest. Her work is forthcoming or has previously appeared in 45th Parallel, Cherry Tree, Dying Dahlia Review, and others. Her handmade chapbook lectio divina for reborn things was published by Press 254 in winter 2018.

Carolyn Nakagawa

Carolyn Nakagawa is a third- and fourth-generation Anglo-Japanese Canadian, and third-generation Vancouverite. Her poems have appeared in The Malahat Review, Poetry is Dead, and The New Quarterly; The Maynard was among her first poetry publications. She is currently developing a historical stage musical, The New Canadians.

Patricia Nelson

Patricia Nelson is the author of Out of the Underworld, published in 2019 by Poetic Matrix Press. Her work has appeared in Blue Unicorn—A Tri-Quarterly of Poetry, Panoply, a literary zine, Rockvale Review, and other journals.

Nora Pace

Nora Pace writes poetry, essays, and fiction. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Peculiar—a Queer Literary Journal, Juniper—A Poetry Journal, Kansas City Voices, and Barren Magazine. She recently attended the Kettle Pond Writers’ Conference. She lives in Providence, Rhode Island, where she teaches English.

Barry Peters

Barry Peters and his wife, the writer, Maureen Sherbondy, live in Durham, North Carolina. He teaches in Raleigh. Publications include The American Journal of Poetry, Best New Poets, Poetry East, and Rattle.

Torben Robertson

Torben Robertson started writing poetry as an adult, and must therefore take full responsibility for his mistake. His poems have appeared in long con magazine, BAD NUDES, Hart House Review, and The Trinity Review. He lived in London, UK, but has now fled coronavirus back to Canada.

Ellie Sawatzky

Ellie Sawatzky (www.elliesawatzky.com, @impromptuprompts) is a poet and fiction writer from Northwestern Ontario, currently living in Vancouver. A 2019 Bronwen Wallace Award finalist, her work has appeared in numerous publications, and her début poetry collection, None of This Belongs to Me, is forthcoming from Nightwood Editions in 2021.

Page Hill Starzinger

Page Hill Starzinger’s (www.PageHillStarzinger.com) second poetry collection, Vortex Street, is forthcoming from Barrow Street Press (May, 2020). Her first, Vestigial, selected by Lynn Emanuel, won the Barrow Street Prize (2013). Unshelter, chosen by Mary Jo Bang, won the Noemi chapbook contest (2009). Poems appear in American Poetry Review, Fence, Volt.

Catherine Strisik

Catherine Strisik, Taos, New Mexico’s Poet Laureate 2020-2022, is the author of Insectum Gravitis (Main Street Rag, 2019); The Mistress (3: A Taos Press, 2016); Thousand-Cricket Song (Plain View Press, 2010, 2016). She’s co-founder/consulting editor of Taos Journal of International Poetry & Art and facilitates poetry workshops in Taos. www.cathystrisik.com

Diane Tucker

Vancouver’s Diane Tucker has published three books of poems, most recently Bonsai Love (Harbour Publishing, 2014). Her work has been published in many anthologies and in more than seventy journals. Her next poetry book, Nostalgia for Moving Parts, will be published by Turnstone Press in 2021.