Meet Our Students
MFA Students
Bree Atkins is an MFA candidate in poetry. She was born and raised in Alabama, completing her
Undergraduate degree in Creative Writing at The University of Alabama at Birmingham.
She has been published in The Torch, Sanctuary, and Aura Literary Magazines. Her poetry follows themes of loss, queerness, religious deconstruction, and healing.
She enjoys spending time with her cat, Clary, frequenting concerts, and binge-watching
the same sitcoms over and over and over.
Finnegan Bly is a queer, Korean-American poet and writer from rural, Northern California. Their
writing and research interests include Korean adoption and diaspora, rural narratives,
and hybrid memoir / (non)fiction. They hold a BA in Literature/Writing from UC San
Diego and are an MFA candidate in Creative Writing at Louisiana State University.
Jasper Graydon is a second-year MFA student in poetry at Louisiana State University and a very silly
goose. They have a B.A. in Japanese and a B.A. in English with a Creative Writing
focus from Ohio State University. Their current poetic fixations include queer experience,
injustice, and the juxtaposition of the natural with the metropolitan. They are obsessed
with stories of all varieties and can often be found reading novels, watching films,
and playing narrative focused video games. Do not talk to them about corn; do share
your worst dad jokes.
Camille Hardee is a second-year MFA candidate at LSU, where she previously received her BA in English.
She loves to cook, take walks, play The Sims 4, and listen to music at inadvisable
volumes. Her writing investigates the human experience through quiet voices of both
the present and the past. Her work has been published in The Delta Journal.
Dalton Wayne Hoover is a third-year MFA candidate at LSU, where he specializes in creative nonfiction.
He is an Army Infantry veteran, a culinary school dropout, an amateur outdoorsman,
and a professional troublemaker. Not surprisingly, he writes about food, conservation,
music, the veteran experience, and the conversation between all of these things. When
not behind the keyboard, he can be found wrangling his wild pack of hunting dogs,
attempting to be a worthwhile husband and father, and kicking out the jams with his
band, Dalton Wayne and the Warmadillos. Find him on Spotify/iTunes/Amazon Music and
at daltonwh23@gmail.com.
Jasmine Knowles is a poet and multidisciplinary learning artist originally from Chicago, IL, raised
in Northwest Indiana. She has received support from the Hurston/Wright Foundation,
Voices of Our Nations Arts (VONA), and the Periplus Collective. Her work can be found
in Obsidian, Honey Literary Magazine, and the V is for Voices! campaign and performance project curated by Aja Monet. She writes to free her voice.
Sirong (Dahlia) Li is a writer from Xishuangbanna in Southern China. She holds a BA in Philosophy from
UC Berkeley and is currently pursuing an MFA at LSU. She serves as associate fiction
editor for New Delta Review and contributes to the Delta Mouth Literary Festival. Her work has received the AARC-PACH
Creative Project Award, a full scholarship to the Tin House Summer Workshop, and the
Romulus Linney Award for Playwriting. She has also been twice nominated for the Tobias
Wolff Award in Fiction, and her fiction has appeared in The Writing Disorder. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, playing the harp, and dancing—both hip-hop
and classical Chinese styles.
Jenna Mark is a third-year MFA candidate from Houston, Texas. She earned her B.S. in Plant and
Environmental Soil Science with an emphasis in Soil and Water from Texas A&M University.
Her work focuses on the intersection between fantasy and science fiction with environmental
science and agriculture. She aims to write stories that not only entertain but also
educate readers of all ages on topics of environmental importance while inspiring
people to be more environmentally conscious. She is combining her dreams of writing
and sustainability into one with eco-storytelling. When she isn’t writing or having
fun with soils, Jenna can be found either with a book in hand or at a concert.
Manuela Silvestre Martínez has trouble sticking to a single genre or language. Originally from Dominican Republic,
she’s held 25 addresses in the last 23 years, and done work for almost as many industries.
She graduated with honors from New York University, earning a B.A. in English Literature
despite spending most of her time on Latino Studies and Creative Writing. Her obsessions
include loops, conviviality, and redemption.
Carolina Murriel is an artist, journalist and death doula. She covered immigration, music, arts & culture, and food & drink for years, and now likes writing weird essays, teaching, and playing with clay. Her taller de vida, Barro y Luna, records Latin elders' oral histories and brings tactile clay meditation to the bedside of dying people. Carolina is a Tin House Summer Workshop and Macondo Writing Workshop scholar, and her work is in NPR.org, Audible, California Sunday Magazine, Prairie Schooner, the Undocupoets anthology Here to Stay, and more. She cofounded Pizza Shark, a podcast studio working toward radical inclusivity in media. They’ve won Webbys, iHeartRadio Podcast Awards, and nominations for Peabody Awards, Ambies and more.
Naomi Claudette Ortiz is an MFA student in poetry. She grew up in Spring Branch, Texas before completing
her undergrad in literature at UAB. She writes about identity, culture, and relationships.
In her free time, she is an avid Formula 1 fan and beach volleyball enjoyer.
carter rekoske is a third-year student from southeast tennessee who enjoys poetry. he is grateful
for all that disentangles him from linear time, including, but not limited to, long
dreamy naps, basketball, the mountains, video games, poems, friends, and caffeine.
you can find his poems in the atlanta review, sinking city, common ground review, and elsewhere.
Mary Thames is an MFA candidate at LSU with a focus on creative nonfiction. She grew up on the
Mississippi Gulf Coast and spent the last five years in New Orleans. She writes about
old ponies, karaoke, pomegranates, and whatever other unassuming memories peek their
heads from behind the curtain. She hopes to craft stage sets for each to come fully
to life.
Sarah Weinstein is a second-year MFA candidate from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. With experience in writing
and directing films, she enjoys crafting fiction that explores the dramatic. She heavily
focuses on wild leading women and indulges in themes of freedom, entrapment, love,
and sexuality. She likes iced coffee.
