2022 Headliners

Gavin Bradley is an award-winning writer from Belfast, Northern Ireland, currently living in Edmonton, on Treaty 6 territory. His work has appeared in The Irish Times, The North, Best New British and Irish Poets, and Glass Buffalo.

Michelle Poirier Brown is an internationally published writer and performer, currently living on the traditional unceeded territories of the syilx peoples, in Vernon, BC. She is nêhiýaw-iskwêw and a citizen of the Métis Nation. Her debut book of poetry, You Might Be Sorry You Read This, is forthcoming in the Robert Kroetsch Series from the University of Alberta Press in Spring 2022.

Michelle writes both poetry and prose. Her poem “Wake” won PRISM international’s Earle Birney Prize in 2019. Other poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Arc, CV2, Grain, The Greensboro Review, Emrys Journal, Plenitude, Right Hand Pointing, untethered, and Vallum; as well as several chapbooks and anthologies. The song cycle, “The Length of a Day” (Jeffrey Ryan, composer), was commission by Pacific Opera Victoria in 2021. Her prose has appeared in The Malahat Review, Release Any Words Stuck Inside of You II and III, The Fieldstone Review, The Sun, and the anthology Dis(s)ent.

A feminist activist, Michelle was the first woman in Canada to win a court case establishing reasonable accommodation in the workplace for breastfeeding women. Now retired from a career as a professional writer and, later, conflict analyst and Federal Treaty Negotiator, she is giving voice to stories she has been sheltering for forty years. 

She continues to write about her research in Transylvania that was the focus of a Community Sabbatical Fellowship at the Centre for Studies in Religion and Society at the University of Victoria, in 2017.

Her more personal work follows three major themes: Indigenous identity, queer identity, and speaking the unspeakable.

Jenna Butler is the author of three books of poetry and ten short collections with small presses. Butler teaches creative writing and eco-criticism at Red Deer College. In the summer, she and her husband live on a small organic farm near the historic Grizzly Trail in Alberta’s north country.

Jennifer Bowering Delisle is the author of Deriving and The Bosun Chair. A collection of lyric essays, Micrographia, is forthcoming in Fall 2023. She is a board member of NeWest Press and the co-chair of the League of Canadian Poets Parenting Poets Community Committee. She is a settler in amiskwaciwâskahikan/Edmonton on Treaty 6 territory.

Marilyn Dumont’s poetry has won provincial and national awards. She has been the writer-in-residence at five Canadian universities and the Edmonton Public Library as well as an advisor in the Aboriginal Emerging Writers Program at the Banff Centre. She teaches sessional creative writing for Athabasca University and Native studies and English for the University of Alberta. She lives in Edmonton, Alberta.

Norma Dunning is an Inuk professor, grandmother and writer. Her short story collection, Tainna (the unseen ons), received the Governor General’s Literary Awards for 2021. Annie Muktuk and Other Stories received the Danuta Gleed award in 2018. Dunning’s first collection of poetry, Eskimo Pie: a poetics of Inuit Identity, was released in 2020. Her second collection of poetry, Akia (the other side), will be published in July 2022. Kinauva? (what’s your name?), Dunning’s first work of nonfiction, will release in 2023. She lives in Edmonton.

Shima Aisha Robinson (aka Dwennimmen) is an amiskwaciy-wâskahikan (Edmonton – Treaty 6) born poet and spoken word artist who embodies, with every poem and pursuit, the ancient meaning of her chosen pen name. Dwennimmen is the name of an ancient African Adinkra symbol, which means strength, humility, learning and wisdom. She brings a wealth of experience in program development and community work to the Edmonton Poetry Festival. For Dwennimmen, poetry has long been a compass, a salve, an anchor and guiding light. She looks forward to reconnecting, fostering community, and celebrating poetry together in ways that are fun, innovative, and accessible.

Hannah Gelderman (she/her) is a settler of Dutch descent living in Amiskwaciwâskahikan (Edmonton, AB). She is an artist, educator and organizer who is most energized by projects that come to life at the intersection of visual arts and climate justice.

Katherine Gibson received her MLIS from McGill University in Montreal before working at the Richmond Public Library in British Columbia, Canada. After a year and half there she took up teaching English in Japan and finally settled down at the Edmonton Public Library in 2010. Katherine leads Capital City Press, EPL’s initiative to support local writers.

She is a member of the Edmonton Poetry Festival Board.

V. Guzman, V, B , AUNTE V is a disabled Non Binary Salvadoran Canadian artist, visionary and organizer, a child of war refugees born and raised in Edmonton Alberta, Treaty 6 Territory . They are known as powerful, scary and intimidating organizer, they were a respected local visual artist in the last decades , specializing in acrylics for Nextfest, their last solo show was back in 2017 at the Aviary. In 2014, V got suckered into performing spoken word poetry and regretted ever since. They don’t call themselves a poet per-say, nor an MC but identify more so as a writer. Their bars are known for its lyricism, melodic rhymes, leaves you breathless sometimes shook. They sometimes write poetry , mostly for for themselves, sometimes for their friends and sometimes for enemies.

Rayanne Haines is an award-winning hybrid author and the 2022 Regional Writer in Residence for the Metro Edmonton Federation of Libraries. Her first full-length poetry collection Stained with the Colours of Sunday Morning (Inanna, 2018) was a finalist for the Canadian Authors Association Exporting Alberta Award. Tell the Birds Your Body is Not a Gun (Frontenac House, 2021) is a current finalist for the Alberta Literary Awards Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry. Her essay This is Normal was shortlisted for the Alberta Literary Awards Jon Whyte Memorial Essay Award. Rayanne is the host of the literary podcast Crow Reads and is an Edmonton Artist Trust Fund recipient. Her poetry and essays have been featured in anthologies and journals in Canada, the UK and the USA.

Canadian writer Nancy Holmes has published six collections of poetry, most recently Arborophobia (University of Alberta Press). She is the editor of Open Wide a Wilderness: Canadian Nature Poems. She is Associate Professor in Creative Writing at The University of British Columbia in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada. With Denise Kenney, she established the Eco Art Incubator, an initiative which supports ecological art in the Okanagan Valley and with Dr. Cameron Cartiere she established an award-winning community-based art project about native pollinators called Border Free Bees. Nancy won the 2015 Robert Kroetsch National Teaching Award in Creative Writing for her innovative student project, Dig Your Neighbourhood, and The Malahat Review’s Constance Rooke Creative Non-Fiction award in 2017.

Indigenous poets sharing truths, making their voices heard, and coming together to build community strength.

Alexis Kienlen is a poet, journalist and novelist who lives on Treaty 6, Edmonton. She currently works as an agricultural journalist with Alberta Farmer newspaper. She is the author of 2 books of poetry, She dreams in Red and 13, and has also written a biography about a Sikh civil rights activist. Her first novel, Mad Cow, was released in April 2020, during the global pandemic.

Theresa Kishkan lives on the Sechelt Peninsula in British Columbia. She has published more than a dozen books, including poetry, fiction, and collections of essays.

Alice Major founded the Edmonton Poetry Festival in 2006 while she was serving as Edmonton’s first poet laureate. (She warns all future laureates to be careful what they start!). Alice has published 12 award-winning collections of poetry, including The Office Tower Tales (which won the Pat Lowther award) and Memory’s Daughter (which received the Stephan G. Stephansson Prize). Her recent book Welcome to the Anthropocene was nominated for three major awards. Her 12th collection is Knife on Snow, released by Turnstone Press in Spring 2023. Other awards include the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Distinguished Artist medal and an honorary doctorate from the University of Alberta. Her website is here.

Kim Mannix is a poet, dark fiction writer, and journalist who lived in six Canadian cities before deciding to call Sherwood Park home. As a lover and supporter of local arts, she’s delighted to be part of the Edmonton Poetry Festival Board. She works as an entertainment and lifestyle writer for MSN, and has had her creative efforts published in several Canadian and international journals and anthologies. She is a co-editor of Watch Your Head, a climate crisis anthology, and is deeply grateful to the earth that sustains us all.

Lisa Martin is the author of two full-length poetry collections, Believing is not the Same as Being Saved (University of Alberta Press, 2017) and One crow sorrow (Brindle & Glass, 2008). Her latest chapbook, Typology (Anstruther Press, 2021), is a sonnet sequence in homage to the Myers-Briggs personality types.

Marco Melfi joined the Edmonton Poetry Festival Board in 2019. His poems have appeared in The Antigonish Review, The New Quarterly, Prairie Fire, The Arc Award of Awesomeness, Funicular, and FreeFall. His chapbook, In between trains, was published in 2014.

Peter Midgley is a poet and storyteller born in South Africa and based in Edmonton. He has performed in several countries around the world and has published three children’s books, one of which, Thuli’s Mattress, won the International Board on Books for Young People Award for Literacy Promotion and has been translated into twenty-seven languages. His latest poetry collection, Let Us Not Think of Them As Barbarians was released in 2019 (NeWest Press).

Catherine Owen is the author of fifteen collections of poetry and prose. Her latest book of poems is Riven (ECW, 2020). Her last performance was at Skirtsafire Festival 2022 as Francesca Woodman. She was born and raised in Vancouver and now lives in a 1905 house in Edmonton where she works as an editor and runs the performance series 94th Street Trobairitz and the poetry podcast Ms Lyric’s Poetry Outlaws.

Paul Pearson is the co-founding editor and chapbook designer for the Olive Reading Series. His poems have appeared in Descant and Event, and the anthology Writing the Land: Alberta Through Its Poets from House of Blue Skies. Raised in a mining town in the mountainous back-country of southeastern British Columbia, Paul has since relocated to Edmonton where he lives and writes with his wife and two children. Lunatic Engine is his debut collection.

Well I’m from New Orleans, I’ve been living in Canada for 26 years… I AM a proud father of four! Like Rumi, Hafiz, La La ded and many other mystical poets I AM a Lover supreme! For I Love all, I Love Life in all it’s glorious infinite expression! I AM also a musician,songwriter and author. In a Word I AM always flowing growing and glowing in Love!

Poets show solidarity with brave Ukrainians as they fight for their freedom and the freedom of all world citizens.

Jason Purcell is a writer and musician living on Treaty 6 territory in Edmonton, Alberta, where they are co-owner of Glass Bookshop. They hold a MA in English from the University of Alberta. Swollening is their first book.

Shazia Hafiz Ramji’s fiction was shortlisted for the Malahat Review’s 2022 Open Season Awards. Her poetry was shortlisted for the 2021 National Magazine Awards and the 2021 Mitchell Prize for Faith and Poetry. Shazia’s award-winning first book is Port of Being. She lives in Calgary and Vancouver where she is at work on a novel and some tunes.

Emily Riddle is Nehiyaw and a member of the Alexander First Nation (Kipohtakaw). A writer, editor, policy analyst, language learner and visual artist, she lives in Amiskwaciwâskahikan (Edmonton). She is the senior advisor of Indigenous relations at the Edmonton Public Library. Her writing has been published in The Globe and Mail, Teen Vogue, The Malahat Review and Room Magazine, among others. In 2021 she was awarded the Edmonton Artists’ Trust Award. Emily Riddle is a semi-dedicated Oilers fan and a dedicated Treaty Six descendant who believes deeply in the brilliance of the Prairies and their people. The Big Melt, published in 2022 by Nightwood Editions, is her first book.

Sampler Café is a diverse community of beat smiths, sample sculptors, pad smashers and musical misfits that work together to promote unity through music and to share beat culture with the masses. From hosting open jam sessions, engaging the community through educational workshops, welcoming guest educators/performers or creating sample-heavy electronic music live as a team, Sampler Cafes approach is focused on opening up the portal of accessibility for newcomers and veterans alike to shape a space to exchange knowledge and new ideas in the art of the beat.

Anna Marie Sewell specializes in collaborative multi-genre projects. MacEwan University’s 2019 Writer-in-Residence, her creative process draws on heritage (Mi’gmaq/Anishinaabe/Polish), music, and multiple languages. Edmonton’s fourth Poet Laureate, she’s published two poetry books. Her first novel, Humane, arrives in 2020 from Stonehouse Press. Her bread recipe was published in 2019, in the University of Alberta cookbook Our Stories, Our Food. Her online home is prairiepomes.com.

Kelly Shepherd’s second poetry collection, Insomnia Bird (Thistledown Press, 2018) won the 2019 Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize, and was shortlisted for the 2019 Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry. Kelly has written seven chapbooks, and he is a poetry editor for the environmental philosophy journal The Trumpeter. He has a Creative Writing MFA from UBC Okanagan (with a thesis on the intersections of ecopoetry and work poetry), and an MA in Religious Studies from the University of Alberta (with a thesis on sacred geography). Originally from Smithers BC, Kelly currently lives in Edmonton, and teaches at NAIT.

Titilope Sonuga is a poet who renders, both in verse and performance, a quality of rootedness and unflinching womanhood that extends beyond the bounds of a single poem or poetic performance. She is the author of three collections of poetry: Down to Earth (2011), Abscess (2014), and This Is How We Disappear (2019) and has composed two spoken word albums, Mother Tongue (2011) and Swim (2019). Her work is expansive, reaching into the realm of theatre, television and advertising campaigns for global brands. She is the 9th Poet Laureate of the City of Edmonton.

Sublime Intervention Collective, also known as S.I.C., is an experimental and collaboration based group of young femme artists out of amiskwaciwáskahikan (Edmonton, Alberta). Starting as a passion project of young artists Lydia Leblanc and
MadJohn! Madden, S.I.C.’s goal has been to initiate connection between creatives within our community, and develop projects that bring together different mediums to explore the creative interaction that can take place across disciplines. S.I.C. has held multidisciplinary events independently as well as a part Next Fest and Edmonton Poetry Festival.

‘Sum’ started writing at the age of 16 & began to freestyle whilst living on the streets of Edmonton at age 17. His submersion into hip-hop culture supported the foundation of his ability to freestyle & eventually song write & experiment with lyricism. This enthusiastic devotion for ‘word smithing’ as an art form, has successfully cultivated an adept ability to express with purpose, passion & power for intentionally conscious, culture informed entertainment. His work covers decolonization, original people’s spirituality, the relationship between personal self & the world around us.

Grayson Thate (he/him) is a poet born in amiskwaciy-wâskahikan (Edmonton). He is currently studying heritage management, and hopes to go to law school in the near future. As a past Youth Poet Laureate, he has been passionate about poetry and how it brings people together for many years. With a background in policy and education, Grayson is excited to be on the Edmonton Poetry Festival board and work to connect people with poetry in ways that are innovative and accessible.

Maigan van der Giessen is Tzadeka: a mother, poet, vocalist, visual artist, organizer, innovator, and all around rabble rouser. Tzadeka makes music that is unpredictable, clever, and magnetic. Female-fronted, experimental political-soul spoken word that’s fresh-as-hell!

Accompanied by the wildly talented Murder Hornettes (Allison Ochoa and Kirsten Elliot), this unstoppable trio is burning up stages across the prairies with their harmonies and hot sauce!

Uchechukwu Peter Umezurike is a Nigerian-born, Calgary-based poet, fiction writer, essayist, and literary journalist. He is the author of Double Wahala, Double Trouble; Wish Maker; and a co-editor of Wreaths for Wayfarers.

Matthew James Weigel is a Dene and Métis poet and artist. He is the designer for Moon Jelly House press and his words and art have been published in Arc, The Polyglot, and The Mamawi Project. Matthew is a National Magazine Award finalist, a Cécile E. Mactaggart Award winner, and winner of the 2020 Vallum Chapbook Award. His chapbook It Was Treaty / It Was Me is available now. Whitemud Walking is his debut collection.