Rodney Gomez was born and raised in Brownsville, Texas. He earned a BA from Yale University, an MA in philosophy from Arizona State University, an MFA from the University of Texas Pan American, and an MPA from the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.
Gomez’s collections include Arsenal with Praise Song (Orison Books, 2020); Geographic Tongue (Pleiades Press, 2020), winner of the Pleiades Press Visual Poetry Series; Ceremony of Sand (YesYes Books, 2019); and Citizens of the Mausoleum (Sundress Publications, 2018). He is the winner of the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize, the Gloria E. Anzaldúa Poetry Prize, and the Rane Arroyo Chapbook Prize.
Edward Vidaurre, poet, editor, publisher, festival director, and City of McAllen Poet Laureate (2018-19).
Priscilla Celina “Lina” Suárez is a Mexican American author who was the 2015-17 McAllen Poet Laureate. She is co-founder of the Gloria Anzaldúa Legacy Project (GAL) which was formed to honor the legacy of Anzaldúa and share her work with a broader public. During her childhood, she lived surrounded by the farmlands of the then small colonia of Las Milpas, TX, where she first heard many of the cuentos she shares in Cuentos Wela Told Me. Her poetry collection, La La Landia: A Journey Through my Frontera CD Shuffle was published in 2022.