After a brief spring break, What The Universe Is: A (Virtual) Reading Series is back and delighted to be hosting two exciting poets!

Subhaga Crystal Bacon (they/them), is the author of five collections of poetry including, A Brief History of My Sex Life, from Lily Poetry Review Books; the Lambda Literary finalist, Transitory, 2023, winner of the BOA Editions, Ltd. Isabella Gardner Award for Poetry; Surrender of Water in Hidden Places, winner of the Red Flag Poetry Chapbook Prize, 2023, released in an expanded second edition in the summer of 2024. 

A Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, Subhaga is an AWP Writer to Writer mentor and teaching artist working in schools and libraries with youth and adults, as well as private students. Their work appears or is forthcoming in a variety of print and online journals including Terrain, West Trestle, The Bellevue Literary Review, Cider Press Review, Prairie Schooner, Nelle and others. A Queer elder, they live in rural northcentral Washington on unceded Methow land. 

Jessica L. Walsh is the author of Blowdown (Small Harbor, 2026) and three previous collections. Her work has appeared on the Best American Poetry Blog and journals like RHINO, Painted Bride Quarterly, Crab Creek Review, and more. Originally from small-town Michigan, she lives near Chicago and teaches at Harper College.

Register at https://bit.ly/WTUIApr2026 so you don’t miss out!