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C.L. “Rooster” Martinez is a spoken word poet, professor, and occasional podcaster from San Antonio, TX. He is the author of three poetry books: Mexican Dinosaur (WAN Publishing 2023; NACCS Tejas Poetry Book Award winning), A Saint for Lost Things (Alabrava Press, 2020) and As it is in Heaven (Kissing Dynamite Poetry Press, 2020). He co-edited Contra: Texas Poets Speak Out, a poetry anthology, and was a writer on the 2016 play, American Pride, which won two ATAC Globe awards for Writing of a Drama and Overall Production of a Drama.
M.R. “Chibbi” Orduña is a Mexican-born, Texas-raised queer poet and spoken word artist, Editor at Chief of Write About Now Publishing and The Mixtape Literary Journal, and director and co-host of the Words and Shit video podcast. He attended Tin House in the summer of 2022, and has self-published 2 books, was a finalist for the 2021 Wax Nine Chapbook Competition and 2022 Robert Phillips Chapbook Competition, and the co-editor of the anthology Contra: Texas Poets Speak Out (Flowersong Press, 2020). His work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Texas Review, Wax Wing, Los Angeles Poet Society, Allium, Cosmonaut Avenue, The Acentos Review, The Latino Book Review Magazine, Buzzfeed, We are Mitu, Button Poetry, Write About Now, and elsewhere. He travels the country performing his work in hopes that audiences feel empowered to embrace their identity, each other, and share their stories. You can find him on IG @gemineyes and on Twitter @gemineyespoetry.