A night of naked words in honor of poet Sarah Sala’s 30th birthday.

List of readers:
Abba Belgrave
Mary Block
Aimee Herman 
Carrie Hohmann 
Jen Hyde 
Ricardo Maldonado 
Amy Meng 
Jerome Murphy 
Peter Longofono 
Christina Quintana
Anthony William Thornton 
Aldrin Valdez 
Sarah Sala

Suggested donation of $5 to support the Bureau. No one turned away for lack of funds.

Sarah Sala is a native Michigander with an MFA in Poetry from New York University. Recently, her poem “Hydrogen” was featured in the “Elements” episode of NPR’s hit show Radio Lab in collaboration with Emotive Fruition. The Ghost Assembly Line, her first chapbook, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press in 2016. Sarah’s poems also appear in Poetry Ireland Review, Atlas Review, and The Stockholm Review of Literature. She is a 2016 Home School Fellow. www.sarahsala.com

Abba Belgrave was born elsewhere but calls Brooklyn her hometown. A graduate of NYU’s Creative Writing Program, she was published in Argos Books’ anthology Why I Am Not A Painter and Phantom Books. Her essay, “Self Censored: When Writing Isn’t Right” was featured on the VIDA website.

Mary Block‘s poems have been featured in Rattle, Conduit, Tampa Review, and Saw Palm, among other publications. Mary was a 2012 finalist for the Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and was a 2015 Pushcart Prize nominee. She is originally from Miami, Florida, and she lives currently in New York City with her husband, her son, and her dog.

Aimee Herman is a queer performance artist and poet. Aimee teaches creative writing and composition in the Bronx. Biggest turn-ons include: farmers markets, gender non-conforming folks and the united states postal service.

Carrie Hohmann teaches writing at Edinboro University. She has degrees from Allegheny College and New York University and is the author of incongruent: someday (dancing girl press, 2014). Carrie lives on a 10-acre farm in Pennsylvania with several lively chickens, her pets, and her husband. Sarah Sala is one of her most favorite people in the world!

Jen Hyde is the author of Hua Shi Hua (画诗华) Drawings & Poems from China, forthcoming from Ahsahta Press. Informed by the material culture of her environment, community, and heritage, her practice experiments with generative translation and new technology for the production of printed things. She holds an MFA in poetry from NYU and is the recipient of writing fellowships from NYU Shanghai and Ithaca College.

Ricky Maldonado was born and raised in Puerto Rico. He is the translator of Dinapiera Di Donato’s Collateral and a recipient of fellowships from Queer/Arts/Mentorship and the New York Foundation for the Arts. He is managing director at the 92Y Unterberg Poetry Center.

Amy Meng’s poetry has appeared in the Indiana Review, The Literary Review, and Pleiades, among others. She is a Kundiman Fellow and poetry editor at Bodega Magazine. She teaches creative writing at Rutgers University and once held a baggie of stainless steel screws that had just been removed from Sarah Sala’s arm.

Jerome Ellison Murphy received an MFA in 2011 from the Creative Writing Program at New York University, where he currently serves as Undergraduate Programs Manager. His critical writing has been featured in LA Review of Books, The Brooklyn Rail, Lambda Literary, American Poets and in the monthly column Outwords, which he authored for Next Magazine from 2010-2011, and he has frequently participated in the Emotive Fruition poetry performance series curated by Thomas Dooley. He currently serves on the board of Lambda Literary Foundation, the world’s foremost non-profit supporting LGBT literature.

Peter Longofono‘s poems have appeared in H_NGM_N, fields, Luna Luna Magazine, and Tenderloin, among others. He serves as the Reviews Editor at Coldfront and makes music with Big Figment and TH!CK. His chapbook, CHORDS, was published in March by the Operating System. He lives in Brooklyn.

Ben Purkert‘s first poetry collection, For the Love of Endings, is coming out from Four Way Books in March 2018. His poems have appeared in the New Yorker, Kenyon Review, Ploughshares, Agni, Boston Review, Best New Poets 2012,and elsewhere. He currently teaches creative writing at Rutgers New Brunswick. More at benpurkert.com.

Christina Quintana is a New York-based writer with Cuban and Louisiana roots. Her writing has been published or is forthcoming in Nimrod International Journal, Raspa Magazine, Foglifter, and Saw Palm, and her plays and musicals have been developed and produced in New Orleans, Atlanta, and New York City. For more information, visit cquintana.com

Anthony William Thornton is a New York-based poet, critic, and a 2016 Fellow of The Home School Miami. He has performed at numerous venues (Bar Thalia for Lamprophonic, Envoy Enterprises, Spectrum, The Bureau of General Services: Queer Division, Interstate Projects, etc.) and has written for the Bureau and Topical Cream. Previously published poems appear in the design monograph “Creating Worlds”, commissioned by Studio Edward Van Vliet in Amsterdam.

Aldrin Valdez is a Pinoy poet and visual artist. They grew up in Manila and Long Island and currently live in Brooklyn. Aldrin has been awarded fellowships from Queer/Art/Mentorship and Poets House. Their work has been published in Art21 Magazine, ArtSlant, BRIC Blog, The Cortland Review, In the Flesh Magazine, and Uncompromising Tang.