SIDEWAYS EIGHT PROJECTS

Poets In The Round Bios

Dani Putney

Dani Putney is a queer, non-binary, mixed-race Filipinx, & neurodivergent writer originally from Sacramento, California. They’re the author of Mix-Mix (Baobab Press, 2025)

& Salamat sa Intersectionality (Okay Donkey Press, 2021), finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Transgender Poetry. They’re also the author of the poetry chapbook Dela Torre (Sundress Publications, 2022) & the creative nonfiction chapbook Swallow Whole (Bullshit Press, 2024), & they’ve received support for their work from the Nevada Arts Council, Mendocino Coast Writers’ Conference, & Association of Writers & Writing Programs.

Their poetry appears in outlets such as Bennington Review, Cream City Review, Foglifter, Grist, Hayden’s Ferry Review, & Puerto del Sol, among others, while their creative nonfiction can be found in journals such as Crab Creek Review, Glassworks Magazine, Quarterly West, & So to Speak, among others. In May of this year they were a spotlight feature artist, sharing an extended set from their most recent book release with Monday Night Poetry as well as the featured poet of study for May of 2025 in the Collective Breath Poetry Book Club. They received their PhD in English from Oklahoma State University & MFA in Creative Writing from Mississippi University for Women. They live in Reno, Nevada.

Courtney Kelly

Courtney Kelly is a queer educator and writer based in Northern Nevada. She is a regular poet at Monday Night Poetry. Her poetry has featured at the Utah Arts Festival, She’s On Fire Art and Music Festival, Nevada Humanities Literary Crawl, Dinner for the Revolution, and Radical Cat Grand Reopening. She is the founder of Reno’s Generative Poetry Workshop and co-founder of the Queerest Little Bookclub and has volunteered as a judge for the Washoe County Poetry Out Loud semi-finals since 2024. She was hired as the editor for “The Illusion of Choice” the debut choose your own adventure poetry book by M. Colton Brodeur  published in 2024.

Iain Watson

Iain is the Founder of Spoken Views Collective (2006) Which is the longest standing, continuously running spoken word and written word poetry organization outside of Las Vegas in the entire state of Nevada. He is a governing member of the Reno Arts and Culture Commission as well as the Nevada Poetry Society in addition to being a public educator in the Washoe County School system of many years. He is the special event touring acts booking agent and promotional organizer for, as well as co-founder of, Monday Night Poetry. He was the opener and host of the world premiere for Insomnia, a spoken word play written by season 15 winner of AGT Brandon Leake. He is a local DJ and Photographer in addition to being a proud cat Dad and Husband to Jamie. Godfather to the spoken word scene in the Biggest Little City. 

Griffin Peralta

Griffin is a Spoken Word Poet, Public Educator, and radio host. He grew up in Reno, Nevada (Reno did most of the growing). He hopes to support his community in any way he can.

Griffin is a 4 time poetry slam champion, taking the title in both Reno and Tahoe.

He teaches English Language Arts  in Washoe County, receiving the Outstanding Educator Award and a commendation from Senator Catherine Cortez Masto in 2018.

Griffin is a long time member of the Spoken Views Poetry Collective, working with the group to create, promote, and perform poetry in Northern Nevada.

Nikki Leialohalani Herschend

Nikki Herschend is a spoken word poet, writer, and performer whose work explores trauma, resilience, political defiance, and ancestral legacy. Drawing from a rich blend of personal experience and cultural heritage, Nikki crafts emotionally charged, rhythmically driven poetry that speaks truth to power and reclaims voice in the face of silence. Their performances are known for their intensity, vulnerability, and unflinching honesty—whether confronting domestic violence, imperialism, or the complexities of identity.

Nikki’s poetry has been featured in competitions, community events, and activist circles including the annual She’s On Fire Festival here in Reno. Their current body of work includes a three-part series on survival and reclamation, as well as pieces that challenge colonial narratives and honor ancestral strength. Nikki’s debut chapbook, She Didn’t Know She’d Live Again, is forthcoming. Nikki is passionate about using language as a tool for liberation and connection.

Michelle Meyers

MICHELLE is an award-winning poet, community activist, and educator. As a founding member of the Asian American female spoken word poetry group Yellow Rage, she was one of the first Asian American women to appear on HBO’s Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry; in the first live Def Poetry Jam show presented at the 2001 HBO U.S.

Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Colorado; and in the Def Poetry Jam College Tour. For over 20 years, Michelle has featured at hundreds of college campuses as well as at many distinguished venues around the country, including the Kennedy Center, BAMcafé, Bowery Poetry Club, Asian American Writers Workshop, Sierra Arts Foundation, Japanese American National Museum, and the Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience.

Employing multiple poetic forms and delivery styles-including narrative, folk arts/storytelling, hip-hop-influenced rhyme, and song-Michelle attempts to employ the raw and intimate power of spoken word poetry in the hopes of taking audiences on an unforgettable journey that educates, challenges, and inspires.

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“I wish for a heart you can see straight through, for a voice

that glows in the dark, and a few really good friends to say, That’s the way to go?”

– Andrea Gibson

“I have never met a heavy heart that wasn’t a phone booth with a red cape inside. Some people will wever understand the kind of superpower it takes for some people to just walk outside. Some days I know my smile looks like the gutter of a falling house, But my hands are always holding tight to the ripchord of believing.”

– Andrea Gibson

Made for… Connection

Jesse Ziegler

I want to introduce you to Jesse Ziegler… he is Reno’s Poet Laureate, one of our prayer partners, and you have, no doubt, seen him around the Rock. He and his lovely wife Amanda have chosen to make the Rock their church home. I’ve asked Jesse to come and share his interpretation of how we are “Made for Connection”. 

So Jesse, welcome!  I wonder if you might share with us some of your thoughts around this idea: 

Some of us find it really difficult to connect with others because of past experiences that didn’t meet our expectations or because we are just on the shy side. Tell us why you think connection can be so difficult.

Sometimes putting ourselves out there is too much of a stretch for our comfort zone because of being shy or feeling awkward. Sometimes putting ourselves out there brings up previous woundedness and/or disappointment. Sometimes there is simply an assumption of failure to some degree. Sometimes there is a lack of perceived self worth which leads to a fear of falling short of other people’s expectations and/or a feeling of not being good enough to maintain initial connections. Sometimes the difficulties in making connections are rooted in logistical elements such as a busy work schedule, lack of reliable transportation, responsibility for care of others such as children or aging parents or a lack of auxiliary income to be able to meet up at a venue where it’s expected to make purchases of some sort. I’m sure there are other aspects of life which might inhibit connections somehow, but these were the ones I could immediately think of.

How do you find “your people”and how do you make yourself take the risk required for connection?

I find my people through my faith based involvement and my arts based involvement. I have made myself take the risk required for connection by becoming a community leader as the creative director of Monday Night Poetry, a companionship volunteer with Gentiva Hospice, a group facilitator of the True Colors Poetry sessions at Our Center, a prayer warrior as a regular church member of The Rock and an active poet in western Nevada as well as Northern California and Las Vegas.

*So what you’re really saying is connection is something you’ve had to invest in, take risks for and work at! There something really beautiful and important about allowing yourself to be seen.

Absolutely! It is often attributed to Thomas Jefferson but I’m not certain as to the source “If you want something you’ve never had, you must be willing to do something you’ve never done” I grew up feeling unintended and unwanted due to my own woundedness. This is not to lay blame at the doorstep of my blood family which was always very small. I think it speaks to a deep longing in me at an early age that was never widely satisfied. C.S. Lewis wrote “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” I understood from a young age, after literally nearly dying by drowning on two separate occasions, that if my depression and unsatisfied longings lead to self harm that my mother would never be able to recuperate. As such I realized as a young adult  it wasn’t a viable option for me to merely endure this world and gut it out for the entire duration of my life in the hopes of a better life in the next  world which may or may not even exist. The alternative to causing myself grave harm was helping to do everything I personally could to help create a world in which I’d want to live. This would obviously include a sense of family and friends which would fill up my cup and reciprocally allow for me to pour out to others who would actually appreciate it rather than mock it. Later, in coming to faith, this would be referred to as “Kingdom Living”. As Rumi said “The cracks are where the light gets in” Ultimately I’ve realized my goal all along has been to become an adult who would’ve helped save me as a child. Only God has the power to  truly save or condemn. However, by connecting with others; truly, deeply and authentically beyond surface level, we get to be advocates, ambassadors and agents of change who help set the stage for others to find their light with assistance from the Holy Spirit. That is the greatest sense of purpose, meaning, calling, belonging and chosen family that I’ve personally found in this life in this world. 

I know some of us are asking, is connection really worth it?

Absolutely. The single greatest opportunity and feeling this life has to offer us is being a part of something larger than just ourselves. The utmost example of this is a deeply abiding connection with the source of all life. Everything else flows from that connection. We may often feel lonely but it is important to remember that we are never alone. We were made to be hardwired for community of some kind. People may have hurt us in the past or let us down but (Spoiler Alert) everyone will hurt us and disappoint us eventually if we know them long enough and well enough. It also might mean that they weren’t for us in the long run but rather a specific reason or a season. Comfort zone is the enemy of growth. Happiness is most real when shared. 

Talk for just a minute about how you have been able to connect with God. How did that develop and what does that look like?

I have most consistently and thoroughly connected with God across my entire life by reading, writing and sharing poetry. I did not fall in love with Jesus until I was 28 years old. I realize looking back that God was pursuing me through the art form long before that in addition to my love of nature/creation. I’m still most frequently able to connect with God through reading and sharing scripture, time in nature, prayer, Bible study, community conversations, morning devotionals, all things poetry, group chats with other believers, meditation/listening prayer, podcasts, inspirational music, men’s breakfast meetings, photography group meetings, mentoring and being mentored by chosen family and reading supplemental material.

Does connection with God affect your connection with others?

For sure. Knowing that I’m connected to God, knowing that relationship is rooted in love and being sustained by it allows for me to have a home base in everything I do. My home is wherever I roam. As such it’s like the difference between a circus performer with a safety net below versus one who works without one. If I know I’m loved and I know I don’t have to fear dying then I am free to love others with abandon and brave vulnerability. I’m free to serve and encourage others without being too concerned with rejection or disappointment. I’m free to risk everything because I know my life is in God’s hands. It makes it easier to stretch well beyond my personal comfort zone mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually when I know that I’m being lead by the spirit. Also, as I step fully into my authentic self, finding my deepest identity in Jesus, answering my calling to be a poet and a counselor, I give others permission around me to step boldly into the fullness of their truest selves. This, in turn, makes it easier to find my people. My tribe. My chosen family. 

Inscription (edited)

Your story is not finished.

The author of life is helping you

write it each and every day.

This journal is for your questions.

Of God and of people.

This is for your prayers.

For the answers you find,

the answers you’re given,

and all that you wish to remember. 

This journal is for the things you notice,

big and small, which give you inspiration 

and bring you joy.

For your ideas and aspirations,

for your hopes and dreams,

your innermost thoughts,

and your wildest adventures.

This journal is for your sketches, lyrics

your quotes and your notes, 

your short stories, poems, 

verses and daydreams.

This is for you.

As you are.

As you are becoming.

As you will be.

This journal is a gift,

just as you are to this world.

FULL BIO FROM WEBSITE:

Brynn Saito (she/her), MA, MFA, is the author of three books of poetry, most recently Under a Future Sky (Red Hen Press, 2023). A 2023 California Arts Council Individual Artist Fellow, Brynn is the winner of the Benjamin Saltman Award and a finalist for the Northern California Book Award. She coedited with Brandon Shimoda The Gate of Memory: Poems by Descendants of Nikkei Wartime Incarceration (Haymarket Books, April 2025). Brynn also co-authored with Traci Brimhall the poetry chapbook, Bright Power, Dark Peace (Diode Editions, 2016) and co-produced with Koji Lau-Ozawa the short documentary Cactus Blossoms Revisited. She teaches in the Creative Writing program at California State University, Fresno, located on the traditional lands of the Yokuts and Mono peoples.

Brynn is a Kundiman Asian American poetry fellow and a two-time recipient of the California State Library’s Civil Liberties Public Education grant for her work with Yonsei Memory Project (YMP). Founded in 2017 with farmer, artist, and writer, Nikiko Masumoto, YMP awakens the archives of Japanese American history through arts-based, intergenerational, and intercultural public programming.

Brynn was featured in Vogue magazine’s “Memory Keepers: Japanese American Internment Survivors and Descendants Speak Out.” She is a recipient of a Densho Artists Initiative grant, a Hedgebrook Residency, and was an artist-in-residence at the Santa Fe Arts Institute’s “Truth and Reconciliation” program. Brynn provided the voice-over narration for the Emmy-winning Valley PBS documentary, Silent Sacrifice: Stories of Japanese American Incarceration. Along with Koji Lau-Ozawa and Brandon Shimoda, she was awarded a grant from The Henri and Tomoye Takahashi Charitable Foundation for programming related to Cactus Blossoms Revisited and The Gate of Memory.

Brynn is a fourth generation Japanese American and Korean American from Fresno, California. She was a finalist for the Milt Kessler Poetry Book Award and the Paterson Poetry Prize. Her poetry has been anthologized by Helen Vendler and Ishmael Reed; it has also appeared in American Poetry Review, the New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Virginia Quarterly Review. Along with Traci Brimhall, Brynn also co-authored the chapbook Wild Recovery, published in Four Quartets: Poetry in the Pandemic (Tupelo Press, 2020).

Brynn has taught in Kearny Street Workshop’s Interdisciplinary Writers Lab for emerging writers of color and has facilitated workshops for Kripalu and the Spiritual Life Foundation. She has been a visiting writer in the MFA programs at University of San Francisco, UNR Lake Tahoe, Saint Mary’s College of California, and California Institute of Integral Studies. Brynn holds degrees from Sarah Lawrence College (MFA, creative writing), New York University (MA, religious studies), and UC Berkeley (BA, philosophy). 

Part I

Awake to the dimming of your doubt,

shout praises skyward as the thunderclap shortens in the storm,

trusting lightening could not possibly strike you twice.

Bow your head while lifting your arms

in defiance of wickedness,

resistance to force or subjugation,

wholehearted surrender

to the manifest goodness of joy unbound.

Sit back-to-back with me

on the edge of the stone wall overlooking the river,

eyes closed,

listing things however small or large

that make us happy,

bring us peace

or give us hope.

Keep going until one of us is tapped out,

and then pretend to laugh

from the bottom of the barrel until we really do.

Keep laughing until it hurts,

that is how we best learn 

to find purpose in the pain somehow,

for wounds are inevitable 

yet so are music and dancing.

Walking in the rain can feel like a baptismal

filled with fireflies and happy tears.

We are not meant to remain in grief,

it must run its proper course of recognition 

and then be enshrined in a place of honor

to commemorate its existence,

giving that love somewhere to go when needed.

Remember that shaking hands can be moved into shaping and service

by steady hearts,

and that shaking hearts

can be calmed into peaceful balance

by determined souls.

Awake to the shining of your light,

sing hymns of brokenness glorified

and abandonment healed.

Meet neglect with tenacity and 

harsh winters with warm embraces.

I wish I could listen to you forever,

hands open on each others backs,

easing burdens by the power of touch,

alleviating spoiled cargo

with each breath

in a joined holding of communal space.

I see you crying in the darkness,

I feel you on the precipice of enlightenment 

not knowing which edge to step from

for the signs marked “abyss” and “paradise”

cannot be read or understood without a proper light.

Stillness can only be maintained for so long.

The very act of continuing to live

is worship of something.

Relief comes soonest to those who welcome the truth.

There are things which cannot die,

there are things which cannot be bought or sold,

things which cannot be coerced or controlled.

There are sacred things.

There are things worth living for

and things worth dying for.

There are things which bring both happiness and peace, 

but the only thing on each of these lists

is love.

Part II

And love cannot be completely contained,

fully accommodated or recklessly restrained.

It isn’t entirely encapsulated by pithy aphorisms,

Disney film plot lines, after school specials

or terse verse in Hallmark cards,

although it is grand enough to exist in all of these spaces.

Love is in the staying late and the getting up early,

the holding of hands bedside in the hospital,

the embracing of an ex on their wedding day,

and continuing the conversation after the lights go out.

Love is pulling weeds from the garden together,

and going out for breakfast on a whim.

It is laughing together in thrift stores picking out the evening’s attire for a fancy date night. 

It exists in genuine connections on blind dates,

and kindred spirits not being bothered by age differences.

Love is in keeping the program from the show that moved you,

permanently rippled on the cover from catching your tears in both acts.

Love is horse riding bareback and barefoot on the beach

and sitting silently together staring at the stars.

It is the genuine smile and warm greeting,

beyond awkward social pleasantries, 

when turning to your neighbor

between the worship songs 

and the needed message.

It is the removal of your shoes and your coat at the door,

knowing you’re going to stay a while.

Love is helping your friend take out the garbage

even when it isn’t your chore that week,

and letting everyone know it’s starting to rain,

in case they left their windows cracked,

or in case they’d wish to open them all the way. 

Love is biker buddies riding up on the curb,

just to give strangers a high five, 

completely unaware they were just coming from an epic poetry and music gathering,

on a Monday in the Biggest Little City,

rapidly becoming the perfect way to punctuate the evening,

and a funny story to tell for the rest of our lives. 

Love is making snow angels before the last run of the day,

climbing trees with our children,

swimming in lakes with our dogs,

and bonfires near the ocean with our chosen families.

Love is wanting to pick the other person up and swing them in the air, 

eyes gently closed

holding onto each other for dear life,

never wanting to let go.

Live music at the farmer’s market on Saturday mornings,

and at the local coffee shop on Thursday afternoons.

Love is you and I getting along the way we do, 

in spite of our differences,

sometimes because of them.

Love is far too big,

too filled with wonder,

too all encompassing 

and too mysterious

to be contained or held 

within a single attempt,

but that is also why

so many of us try.

“here is your gentle reminder that there are dandelions growing through cracks in the sidewalk. there is a fence lizard on the porch who is growing a new tail. there are trees growing through an abandoned house, branches tearing through the ceiling, ferns carpeting the floor. there is life pushing forward, pushing through.”

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“Because I carry it well doesn’t mean it’s not heavy.”

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“You lived

two decades

with nothing but your spine holding you up. the way light does not care if shadows follow you do not have to be wanted

—to prove you are real.”

– natalie wee, never been kissed

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“The south is so amazing. Just talked to an old man by the river about micro plastics and he said “There’s glitter in our veins that will long outlast our bones” then he just walked away from me.”

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A three-year-old brought me a bit of

black paper. “Look”, she said, “I found a

piece of night!”

We’re all born poets, but slowly we

forget.

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“Everything is more beautiful because we are doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again”

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“if no art makes you feel anything, make your own art and feel something”

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“Why do you people feel profound thought has to come from high places? The gutter looks at the stars too”

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“They fall from the sky sometimes, looking for a place to grow”

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“How liberating it is to pursue wholeness instead of perfection”

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“of course i feel too much, im a universe of exploding stars.”

– S. ajna

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“In Simberg’s garden the humble Death-like figures struggle against harsh conditions; the landscape around the garden has burnt yellow, it is dry and barren. The cherished flowers grow in exotic shapes, slowly, requiring constant care. The black-clad figures love their nurslings.

The garden is a place where Death is allowed to realize its feelings of affection. The Garden of Death can be seen depicting the impossibility of this love; maybe the flowers are tender and fragile because they can not handle the love of Death. Love has two faces: one of them is the face of devastation.”

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“Wasn’t that the definition of home?

Not where you are from, but where you are wanted.”

Abraham Verghese

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“if it was good, it would have stayed”

“and do you cry over that which has passed? i swear to you, if there was any good in it, it would have stayed.”

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“i am not brave but sometimes i am made brave by my friends which is to say i am made brave by love”

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“It’s a fitting punishment for a monster. To want something so much— to hold it in your arms and know beyond a doubt you will never deserve it.”

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“HEALING INVOLVES

DISCOMFORT, BUT SO DOES REFUSING TO HEAL.

ANU, OVER TIME REFUSING TO HEAL IS

ALWAYS MORE PAINFUL.”

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“And when you no longer explain yourself, not out of pride but exhaustion

is that strength, or quiet surrender?”

———————————————————————

“And when the mirror no longer reflects who you were

is it growth, or are you simply gone?”

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Haiku:

yes bacon makes the

world darker so the cat needs

more light to see by

———————————————————————

art never comes first.

first came the blood, the nights, the fever,

the lonely walk in the park.

-vesmir

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“They’re going to bury you three feet deep, because you’ve only ever been half a man” sounds like a raw ass line from Shakespeare or something buts actually from me yelling at my cat for stealing my sandwich while I was getting a drink.

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Bio From Dani’s Website:

https://daniputney.com/

Proudly in Collaboration with:

Thistle & Nightshade Bookstore

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ALSO CHECK OUT THE NEW RELEASE FROM SUNDRESS PUBLICATIONS:

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