Wall Down Ramallah by Minyong Cho is available for presale as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here). Born in Seoul, Korea, Cho immigrated to California when she was 16. In 2007, then 32 years old, she moved to the West Bank to finish her PhD dissertation in Islamic art history. There, one question about her past gnawed at her: why did she experience abuse as a child but not her sister?

In Wall Down Ramallah, Cho alternates memories of Korea with her life in Palestine, eliciting feelings of being completely and permanently outside any “home.” In liminal spaces like the Qalandia military checkpoint and the haunted hallways of a Jerusalem dormitory, and through the thin walls of the houses she moved through, she pieced together what her parents might have been hiding behind closed doors. The result of her profound, heartbreaking obsession with her personal history is Wall Down Ramallah.

Learn more about Cho in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/inhabiting-your-voice-interview-minyong-cho-wall-down-ramallah

The cover image is Yusuf fleeing the Advances of Zulaikha (1488) by Kamal Al-Din Behzad, currently in the Egyptian National Library and Archives and in the public domain on Wikimedia Commons. Cover design is by Alexa Laharty.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Yellow Arrow is excited to announce the theme for our next issue.

This issue will those moments in life, in the creative process or otherwise, when you let go of the outcome. Learn more about the issue’s topic and the guest editors of VIGIL, Gwen Van Velsor and Annie Marhefka, at yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/art-letting-go-guest-editor-yaj-xi-02-vanvelsor-marhefka.

To learn more about our submissions guidelines, visit yellowarrowpublishing.com/submissions. Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Yellow Arrow Publishing would like to announce the next guest editors (we’ve decided on two!) for Yellow Arrow Journal: Gwen Van Velsor and Annie Marhefka. They are both well known to our community, and we are excited to have both oversee the creation of our Vol. XI, No. 2, issue (fall 2026) during our 10-year anniversary. What better way to celebrate 10 years of Yellow Arrow Publishing than with the founder and current executive director reflecting and illuminating women creatives together!

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/art-letting-go-guest-editor-yaj-xi-02-vanvelsor-marhefka

Gwen Van Velsor loves writers and writing and finds great value in the act of creating and sharing the written word. She founded Yellow Arrow Publishing in 2016 in Baltimore, Maryland, after publishing her first book. Her work has appeared on various platforms since then, as handbound books, on websites, and on library shelves. Her fulfilling work with Yellow Arrow contributed to the publication of many other writers, of which she is immensely proud. Her current yellow arrows have led to candidacy for rostered ministry in the ELCA Lutheran church while pursuing a MDiv at United Lutheran Seminary. Gwen is from Portland, Oregon, and is proud to call Baltimore home, where she lives with her daughter and enjoys swimming, hiking, and camping.

Annie Marhefka is a writer in Baltimore, Maryland; she is the recipient of the 2024 Eunice Williams Nonfiction Prize, has been featured on The Slowdown Show and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Annie is the executive director at Yellow Arrow Publishing, a Baltimore-based nonprofit empowering women-identifying writers. Annie has received support from the Maryland State Arts Council, Gullkistan Center for the Arts, Martha’s Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing, and Tin House. She has a BA in creative writing and a MBA from Washington College and is a MFA candidate at the University of Baltimore. She has authored two collections: Strangers We Know By Heart with Garden Party Collective and Baltimore, a travelogue memoir, for the Writer in Sites series by Scrawl Place. When Annie is not writing, she is usually trying to find her way back to the water. Follow Annie on Instagram @anniemarhefka and at anniemarhefka.com.

With that in mind, we think the topic of the issue is fitting and can’t wait to see what everyone sends in. Creative practices require a certain letting go, whether it be in the act of writing or in the moment when the writing is shared with others. We don’t know where our creativity will lead, and we don’t know what will become of it. For Yellow Arrow Journal, Vol. XI, No. 2, we are interested in hearing about those moments in life, in the creative process or otherwise, when you let go of the outcome.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS:

• Theme announcement: July 20

• Submissions open: August 1

• Submissions close: August 31

• Issue release: November 10

Wall Down Ramallah by Minyong Cho is available for presale as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here). Born in Seoul, Korea, Cho immigrated to California when she was 16. In 2007, then 32 years old, she moved to the West Bank to finish her PhD dissertation in Islamic art history. There, one question about her past gnawed at her: why did she experience abuse as a child but not her sister?

In Wall Down Ramallah, Cho alternates memories of Korea with her life in Palestine, eliciting feelings of being completely and permanently outside any “home.” In liminal spaces like the Qalandia military checkpoint and the haunted hallways of a Jerusalem dormitory, and through the thin walls of the houses she moved through, she pieced together what her parents might have been hiding behind closed doors. The result of her profound, heartbreaking obsession with her personal history is Wall Down Ramallah.

Learn more about Cho in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/inhabiting-your-voice-interview-minyong-cho-wall-down-ramallah

The cover image is Yusuf fleeing the Advances of Zulaikha (1488) by Kamal Al-Din Behzad, currently in the Egyptian National Library and Archives and in the public domain on Wikimedia Commons. Cover design is by Alexa Laharty.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

We will be hosting a virtual reading for our readers on ZOOM with WONDER’s contributors! Please join us for a night full of WONDER.

Don’t forget to RSVP: facebook.com/share/17ikGdmH93

Meeting (Zoom) link: us06web.zoom.us/j/82512859412

From June 1 to 30, Yellow Arrow Publishing is accepting submissions of poetry, creative nonfiction, and hybrid chapbooks (combination of poetry and prose) by authors who identify as women from around the world. For more information, see yellowarrowpublishing.com/cbsubmissions. You will be asked to submit through the YAP Chapbook Submissions Form.

Please note that as a small press we produce a limited number of publications each year. We pour our hearts and souls into each submission and each Yellow Arrow publication and thank everyone for their interest and inquiries.

Learn more about our guidelines and check out our FAQs at yellowarrowpublishing.com/cbsubmissions. Please read the guidelines completely before submitting.

Join us at the Bird in Hand for an evening with 3 Baltimore-based writers: Emily Decker, Michele Evans, and Amelia Franz, for a joint reading and book release!

These three books provide distinct reflections around a few key themes: community, belonging, lineage, and pathways into a better future. We hope you'll join us and join in.

11 E. 33rd St. 21218

Eventbrite: A Reading with Emily Decker, Michele Evans, and Amelia Franz Tickets, 
Bird in Hand: https://www.birdinhandcafe.com/events

Yellow Arrow Journal’s Vol. XI, No. 1 issue (spring 2026) on WONDER, guest edited by Heather Brown Barrett, is now available as a paperback and a PDF from the Yellow Arrow bookstore. You can also find WONDER through most online distributors.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/yaj-wonder-release-weaving-curiosity-creativity

WONDER explores the interplay between curiosity and creativity and how it informs discovery in the personal creative process and encourages artistry and fulfillment for women-identifying writers. The cover of WONDER features the artwork Twin Heathers by Anita Grace Brown, a multidisciplinary artist exploring the intersections of the imaginal, the spiritual, and the visceral, somatic human experience. For Heather, choosing the final cover came down to the mystery and expressive brush strokes offered by Anita’s Twin Heathers. Two subtle figures, similar but not exact; do they represent two selves present in each of us, or two different entities, like friends, or enemies? Are they children, or spirits, or flowers? Are they all of these? Interpretations abound. It’s a garden, a riot of color, and it’s thought-provoking. Thank you, Anita, for sending us your artwork and for letting us showcase it to our community. Look for an interview with the artist to come out tomorrow.

You can learn more about Heather and the issue at yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/curiosity-creativity-guest-editor-yaj-xi-01-barrett. Get your copy of WONDER today at yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/yellow-arrow-journal-wonder-paperback. Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Bear Fragments

$28 for one session in May

A person might not remember everything you say, but they’ll remember how you made them feel. Illuminating the “truth” within a reader—that tingle, or gut punch, or nausea, or warmth, etc. —is part of a writer’s magic. Each writer has a different magic formula for their spell, and you have to experiment. Practicing your magic formula, ensuring that your meaningful goals land with your reader, takes both technique and also some amount of artistic play. After this workshop, you’ll have familiarized yourself with new tools to elicit strong impressions and emotive gestures for your reader beyond plot (like structure, detail, and musicality) which can be applied to your work in creative ways.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/bearfragments

When: 11:00 am-12:30 pm EST

May 17

Cost: $28

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Lillian Deja Snortland’s poetry, essays, features, creative nonfiction, and short stories have appeared in Postscript Magazine, OUCH! Magazine, Goucher Magazine, Yellow Arrow Publishing, and Amplify Arts publications, as well as been performed at Voxel theater and exhibited at the Temporary Arts Centre in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Her essay “The Tragedies of Ecstasy” was nominated for a 2025 Pushcart Prize through After the Art literary magazine.

Her work moves within the intersection of internal social anxiety and external visceral transformation, often situated in surreal liminal spaces and featuring the permeability of the physical body. She loves collaborating with teams in any creative medium, including film writing/production (having participated in the Baltimore 48 Hour Film Project and the Maryland 72 Film Fest), tabletop role-play, and musical jams.

Originally from Eugene, Oregon, Snortland graduated from Carleton College with a B.A. in Classical Studies and a Minor in French/Francophone Studies, and has an M.F.A in Nonfiction from Goucher College. She enjoys lounging in parks, zooming via public transit to Baltimore cultural events, and hosting thematic parties in her apartment.

Creating Your PR Toolkit with Cherrie Woods

$25 each session for 1 session in May

All authors need to have a public relations (PR) Toolkit. This micro-workshop will familiarize authors with the four toolkit components: headshot, book cover, bio, and book synopsis.

When: May 16, 11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. EST

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Cherrie Woods is a book publicist, PR consultant, and  workshop facilitator with 20+ years of experience. She has worked with 100+ authors nationwide and led 50+ hands-on PR and  marketing workshops. Author of Where Do I Start? 10 PR Questions and Answers to Guide Self-Published Authors, Cherrie has held leadership roles with the Maryland Writers’ Association and a board position at Baltimore Public Relations Council. She currently serves on the board of the Baltimore CityLit Project and is also an award-winning poet.

Yellow Arrow Vignette LUMINATE submissions are open from May 15 to June 25 and will align with the 2026 Yellow Arrow yearly value LUMINATE. Learn more about our submissions guidelines at yellowarrowpublishing.com/vignette/submissions.

LUMINATE is elemental, existential. Without a light source, there is only darkness. This is why we want to shine a neon light onto Baltimore creatives this year.

: to be shaken, electrified into vivid color

: to blare with welcome

: to embrace and celebrate the self that has been contained for too long

: to buzz with audacity

: to seep into darkness

: to call others like you to find their home

Now in its fifth season, Yellow Arrow Vignette is an online creative nonfiction and poetry series developed to better feature women-identifying writers specifically in the Baltimore area and share their voices beyond Yellow Arrow Journal and our single-author publications.

This year’s guest editor for LUMINATE is Zoë Huettl (she/her). Zoë is a poet and educator from Chicago, Illinois, and a current MFA student at the University of Baltimore. When not crafting or writing, she can be found haunting local alleys with her dog, Harper. The Vignette team, led by Sydney Alexander, look forward to working with Zoë for the next few months.

Yellow Arrow Vignette LUMINATE is looking for poetry, creative nonfiction, and cover art by creatives who identify as women with a connection to the Baltimore area. We look forward to embracing and celebrating the voices of creatives connected to our home base of Baltimore, Maryland.

Here are some guiding questions about the topic and theme:

• What do you show others that invites them to express themselves?

• How do you create a community that is vibrant, resilient, and resisting the dark?

• How do you celebrate the aspects of self that are luminous in yourself and in those around you?

• If there was a neon sign above you, what would it say? To what are you open to, and do you stay open late?

Please read our guidelines carefully and review past editions of Vignette before submitting. This issue will be released in August 2026.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Writing Ecopoetry with Joanne Durham

$28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

The term “ecopoetry” emerged as poets recognized the need to rethink how we respect and protect non-human life. We will read and discuss contemporary poetry that attempts, through a variety of approaches, to contribute to honoring and saving our endangered planet. We’ll spend some time each session drafting poems based on the models provided, with optional sharing.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/writingecopoetry

When: 7-8:30 pm EST

March 24, April 14, May 5

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl, winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize (Evening Street Press 2022) and the chapbook, On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay 2023). Among her many awards are the Miriam Chaikin Poetry Prize, Third Wednesday’s annual poetry prize, and finalist for the Lascaux Poetry Prize. Over 100 of her poems appear in literary journals

and anthologies, including ecopoems in The Nature of Our Times anthology, Cutthroat, Banyan Review, Cold Mountain Review and others. She brings twenty-five years of teaching experience to her poetry workshops. Learn more about her at https://www.joannedurham.com.

It’s cover reveal time! Yellow Arrow Journal’s Vol. XI, No. 1 issue (spring 2026) on WONDER, guest edited by Heather Brown Barrett. The issue will be released on May 19. Reserve your copy today.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/yellow-arrow-journal-wonder-paperback

WONDER explores the interplay between curiosity and creativity and how it informs discovery in the personal creative process and encourages artistry and fulfillment for women-identifying writers. The cover of WONDER features the artwork Twin Heathers by Anita Grace Brown, a multidisciplinary artist exploring the intersections of the imaginal, the spiritual, and the visceral, somatic human experience. For Heather, choosing the final cover came down to the mystery and expressive brush strokes offered by Anita’s Twin Heathers. Two subtle figures, similar but not exact; do they represent two selves present in each of us, or two different entities, like friends, or enemies? Are they children, or spirits, or flowers? Are they all of these? Interpretations abound. It’s a garden, a riot of color, and it’s thought-provoking. Thank you, Anita, for sending us your artwork and for letting us showcase it to our community. Look for an interview with the artist to come out tomorrow.

You can learn more about Heather and the issue at yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/curiosity-creativity-guest-editor-yaj-xi-01-barrett. Get your copy of WONDER today at yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/yellow-arrow-journal-wonder-paperback. Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

Girl, Drowning by Dana Knott (she/her) is now available as a paperback and PDF (you can order multiple copies at a discount here).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/girl-drowning-release-dana-knott

The poems within Girl, Drowning were inspired by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1829–1862), a pre-Raphaelite model, muse, poet, and artist. Much attention rests on Siddal’s fame as the model for John Everett Millais’ Ophelia (1851–1852), her laudanum addiction, and the exhumation of her corpse years after her death, so that her husband, artist and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, could retrieve a poetry manuscript he placed in her coffin. Girl, Drowning intends to amplify Siddal’s voice and fill in other, rich details of her life, including her aspirations as a poet and artist and her desire for autonomy. Beneath the surface lies a woman who longed to be seen and loved as Siddal, the individual, rather than model, muse, and wife.

Knott, born in Chicago, Illinois, and residing in Delaware, Ohio, works in Columbus as Director of Libraries at the Columbus State Library. In 2021 she launched tiny wren lit, which publishes micropoetry online with downloadable zines for each issue, and in 2024 she published the microchapbook Funeral Flowers (Rinky Dink Press).

Learn more about Knott in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/muse-mayhem-interview-dana-knott-girl-drowning

‍Cover image and design by Alexa Laharty and interior images by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Writing Ecopoetry with Joanne Durham

$28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

The term “ecopoetry” emerged as poets recognized the need to rethink how we respect and protect non-human life. We will read and discuss contemporary poetry that attempts, through a variety of approaches, to contribute to honoring and saving our endangered planet. We’ll spend some time each session drafting poems based on the models provided, with optional sharing.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/writingecopoetry

When: 7-8:30 pm EST

March 24, April 14, May 5

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl, winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize (Evening Street Press 2022) and the chapbook, On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay 2023). Among her many awards are the Miriam Chaikin Poetry Prize, Third Wednesday’s annual poetry prize, and finalist for the Lascaux Poetry Prize. Over 100 of her poems appear in literary journals

and anthologies, including ecopoems in The Nature of Our Times anthology, Cutthroat, Banyan Review, Cold Mountain Review and others. She brings twenty-five years of teaching experience to her poetry workshops. Learn more about her at https://www.joannedurham.com.

Micro Fiction: Craft and Publish

$30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

What is micro fiction in the context of a woman's busy and plucky life? In this workshop we will navigate and dissect the 50-word micro fiction/nonfiction art form. Weekly, we will enjoy the quality micro fiction work of other women across culture and identity through a "read, discuss, try it, and prepare for publication" approach. Micro fiction differs from poetry in that it's living prose, but is also related in that it reveals a narrative that is sometimes hard to tell. We will discover how the 50-word piece can pack a punch that is often more effective than longer prose.

There is a market and need for well-written, women-centric micro fiction, and we will unearth it.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/microfiction

When: 6:30 -8:30 pm EST

April 2, April 9, April 16

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Elaina has seen her poetry, essays, and short stories published across dozens of literary journals. She’s also served as Editor in Chief for installment number two of a micro fiction anthology called 50-word Stories of 2023, while also acting as an acquisitions reader for Vine Leaves Press in the genres of memoir and historical fiction. She is also an active member of the Ocean County chapter for NOW: National Organization for Women.

Over the course of the last two years, Elaina has continued to devote her time to a few very important purposes—her favorite being The Toms River Arts Community (TRAC), bringing to fruition one of her final graduate projects that began as a hypothetical. In June 2025, Elaina collaborated with a two Jersey Shore high schools to collect and curate poetry, paintings, and textiles for a Queer Art Exhibition currently displayed in one of the main gallery windows in downtown Toms River. Future art exhibits for TRAC will call upon Elaina’s writing skills for informational panels and object labels. Elaina also served as communications coordinator for the Trans Equity Coalition’s community social calendar in 2024: a grassroots resource for transgender and nonbinary individuals in New Jersey.

Elaina is a writer, teacher, and graduate student. She wrote a short memoir collection of essays and poetry (Italian Bones in the Snow) and a short story collection (Heart and Salt) both published by Vine Leaves Press. She loves ice cream, antiques, dogs, and actively advocating for LGBTQ+ community. She’s a graduate student through CUNY in Museum Studies. Her newest memoir about growing up with sensory dysregulation in the 1980s and 1990s called Chomp, Press, Pull is a full-on immersive encounter. She loves ice cream, antiques, and fabric patterns.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

Micro Fiction: Craft and Publish

$30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

What is micro fiction in the context of a woman's busy and plucky life? In this workshop we will navigate and dissect the 50-word micro fiction/nonfiction art form. Weekly, we will enjoy the quality micro fiction work of other women across culture and identity through a "read, discuss, try it, and prepare for publication" approach. Micro fiction differs from poetry in that it's living prose, but is also related in that it reveals a narrative that is sometimes hard to tell. We will discover how the 50-word piece can pack a punch that is often more effective than longer prose.

There is a market and need for well-written, women-centric micro fiction, and we will unearth it.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/microfiction

When: 6:30 -8:30 pm EST

April 2, April 9, April 16

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Elaina has seen her poetry, essays, and short stories published across dozens of literary journals. She’s also served as Editor in Chief for installment number two of a micro fiction anthology called 50-word Stories of 2023, while also acting as an acquisitions reader for Vine Leaves Press in the genres of memoir and historical fiction. She is also an active member of the Ocean County chapter for NOW: National Organization for Women.

Over the course of the last two years, Elaina has continued to devote her time to a few very important purposes—her favorite being The Toms River Arts Community (TRAC), bringing to fruition one of her final graduate projects that began as a hypothetical. In June 2025, Elaina collaborated with a two Jersey Shore high schools to collect and curate poetry, paintings, and textiles for a Queer Art Exhibition currently displayed in one of the main gallery windows in downtown Toms River. Future art exhibits for TRAC will call upon Elaina’s writing skills for informational panels and object labels. Elaina also served as communications coordinator for the Trans Equity Coalition’s community social calendar in 2024: a grassroots resource for transgender and nonbinary individuals in New Jersey.

Elaina is a writer, teacher, and graduate student. She wrote a short memoir collection of essays and poetry (Italian Bones in the Snow) and a short story collection (Heart and Salt) both published by Vine Leaves Press. She loves ice cream, antiques, dogs, and actively advocating for LGBTQ+ community. She’s a graduate student through CUNY in Museum Studies. Her newest memoir about growing up with sensory dysregulation in the 1980s and 1990s called Chomp, Press, Pull is a full-on immersive encounter. She loves ice cream, antiques, and fabric patterns.

Writing Ecopoetry with Joanne Durham

$28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

The term “ecopoetry” emerged as poets recognized the need to rethink how we respect and protect non-human life. We will read and discuss contemporary poetry that attempts, through a variety of approaches, to contribute to honoring and saving our endangered planet. We’ll spend some time each session drafting poems based on the models provided, with optional sharing.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/writingecopoetry

When: 7-8:30 pm EST

March 24, April 14, May 5

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl, winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize (Evening Street Press 2022) and the chapbook, On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay 2023). Among her many awards are the Miriam Chaikin Poetry Prize, Third Wednesday’s annual poetry prize, and finalist for the Lascaux Poetry Prize. Over 100 of her poems appear in literary journals

and anthologies, including ecopoems in The Nature of Our Times anthology, Cutthroat, Banyan Review, Cold Mountain Review and others. She brings twenty-five years of teaching experience to her poetry workshops. Learn more about her at https://www.joannedurham.com.

Girl, Drowning by Dana Knott (she/her) is now available for presale as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/girl-drowning-paperback

The poems within Girl, Drowning were inspired by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1829–1862), a pre-Raphaelite model, muse, poet, and artist. Much attention rests on Siddal’s fame as the model for John Everett Millais’ Ophelia (1851–1852), her laudanum addiction, and the exhumation of her corpse years after her death, so that her husband, artist and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, could retrieve a poetry manuscript he placed in her coffin. Girl, Drowning intends to amplify Siddal’s voice and fill in other, rich details of her life, including her aspirations as a poet and artist and her desire for autonomy. Beneath the surface lies a woman who longed to be seen and loved as Siddal, the individual, rather than model, muse, and wife.

Knott, born in Chicago, Illinois, and residing in Delaware, Ohio, works in Columbus as Director of Libraries at the Columbus State Library. In 2021 she launched tiny wren lit, which publishes micropoetry online with downloadable zines for each issue, and in 2024 she published the microchapbook Funeral Flowers (Rinky Dink Press).

Learn more about Knott in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/muse-mayhem-interview-dana-knott-girl-drowning

‍Cover image and design by Alexa Laharty and interior images by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

In partnership with CityLit Project. RSVP here.

Join local publishers The Baltimore Review, Yellow Arrow Publishing, Mason Jar Press, Washington Writers’ Publishing House, Akinoga Press, and Modern Artist Press at Baltimore’s famous Pickles Pub for a fun, fabulous celebration of more than 100 combined years of publishing some of the finest literary work! Grab a beer, sample some true Baltimore grub, and when it’s time for John Waters’s keynote, just walk across the street from Pickles, right back to the Convention Center.

RSVP here.