Valois J. Vera, aka “Crip Lyrical”, is a Disabled Revolutionary, Poet/Spoken Word Artist and Activist based out of Denton, TX. His experience in and knowledge of Disability Justice, Culture and Identity is well noted. He has served on several social justice boards and commissions and has garnered many speaking opportunities including the University of North Texas, Fordham University and Azusa Pacific University. His journalism work can be found in New Mobility Magazine, Latino Rebels, and Rooted in Rights, while their poetry has been published by Spoonie Press, Mollyhouse, and in the anthology American Graveyard: Calls to end Gun Violence, Volume I (Read or Green Books). Their debut collection Crip Lyrics: the Unapologetic Poetry of Disability (POOR Press) is an illustrated collection of liberation verses guided by lived experiences and self-reflection. His second collection, I, The Revolution will be released later this year. He is the Founder of Thunder & Lightning Poetry Collective and facilitator of a variety of writing workshops and open mics. They also perform a one-poet-show called “CripPoetix!”

Brett Benson is a high school educator, tutor and writer based out of San Francisco with San Diego roots. Most of his work revolves around topics such as nature, human consciousness, societal observations and motivational free verse. He is working on his first book currently. While away from the classroom, he enjoys typewriter poetry, being a “poet-4-hire” in many locations around California, hikes in open wilderness locations, reading materials from a variety of genres and spending time with his partner. He is an advocate of perennialism, “human universalism” and other uniting concepts which focus on humanity and the push to recognize the unity between people, animals and the planet as a whole.

Kim Shuck, who was named San Francisco’s seventh poet laureate in 2017 and served in that role for three years, is a Tsalagi (Cherokee)/Euro-American poet, author, weaver and bead work artist who draws from Southeastern Native American culture and tradition as well as contemporary urban Indian life. Born in San Francisco, she belongs to the northern California Cherokee diaspora. She is a member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. She earned a B.A. in art (1994), and an M.F.A. in Textiles (1998) from San Francisco State University. Her basket weaving work is influenced by her grandmother Etta Mae Rowe and the long history of California Native American basket making. She has taught American Indian Studies at San Francisco State University and was an artist in residence at the de Young Museum in June 2010 with Michael Horse.