Poets, Pizza, and Jazz

Cathryn Essinger is the author of five poetry collections, served as Ohio Poet of the Year in 2005, nurtures butterflies, contributes to ecological journals, and is a retired professor of English from Edison State.

David Garrison is a highly published poet who was named Ohio Poet of the Year in 2014 and received the Paul Lawrence Dunbar Prize in 2009. He is a retired professor of Spanish and Portuguese from Wright State University and recently released the book "Light in the River."

Janet E. Irvin is a dedicated educator and the author of seven mystery and thriller novels. She has won the Jeremiah Healey Mystery Fiction Contest and the Whodunnit Award. Recently, she has also begun exploring poetry and has achieved notable success in publishing within this genre.

Aimee Noel focuses on working-class poetry and has received widespread recognition for her writing, including the Ohio Arts Council 2020 Individual Excellence Award for Poetry. She remarks, "I tend to write to reveal" about the shared human experience.

Myrna Stone is the author of six full-length poetry collections and has received three Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Awards for Poetry and the 2017 New Letters Prize in Poetry. She has also been a faculty member at the Antioch Writers Workshop.