TEEN SEQUINS year-in-review!

This marked our 3rd annual TEEN SEQUINS feature, and phew, ya’ll are growing up so fast. Have a look and see, in their own words, what happened for some of our teens (past and present) this year!

2016’s Age 19 featured poet Brad Trumpfheller had poems appear in Breakwater Review, Muzzle, Gigantic Sequins, Indiana Review, and elsewhere. Poems of theirs are forthcoming in 2018 from West Branch, Puerto del Sol, and The Nation. Find them on Twitter at @bradtrumpfh!

Since early fall of this year, 2017’s Age 15 featured poet Emily Tian has been kept plenty busy reading poetry submissions to The Adroit Journal!

For Daniel Blokh, 2015’s Age 14 featured poet, 2017 brought conflict after the folding of ELJ Publications, which was to publish his chapbook Grimmening the next year. However, after a number of presses opened their doors to dropped ELJ manuscripts, Grimmening was picked up by Diode Editions (an absolute dream press!) for publication in 2018. This, along with the publication of his first chapbook, Holding Myself Hostage in the Kitchen (Lit City Publishing, 2017), has made 2017 a year of incredible blessings – and excitement for the next! Find him on Twitter at @danielblokh!

This year, 2016’s Age 18 featured poet Talia Flores was published in Glass: A Journal of Poetry, The Shade Journal, Hobart, and Cosmonauts Avenue. She has work forthcoming in Bennington Review and Tinderbox Poetry Journal, in which she is a finalist for the 2017 Brett Elizabeth Jenkins Poetry Prize.

This year, 2015’s Age 16 featured poet Kathryn Hargett is a college kid from Alabama, a Best of the Net and Pushcart-nominee, and a Kundiman fellow in poetry. Her work has been recognized by Princeton University, the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, the National YoungArts Foundation,  the Poetry Society of the United Kingdom, and others. She is the editor-in-chief of TRACK//FOUR, a literary magazine for people of color, and interns for Winter Tangerine. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Anomaly (FKA Drunken Boat), the Adroit Journal, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and Cosmonauts Avenue.

2017’s Age 14 featured poet Sarah Feng recently turned 15! This February, she started writing poetry. Now a poetry alum of the The Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program, she received the the Best of Issue scholarship for the summer issue of National Poetry Quarterly and the 2017 Critical Pass Junior Poet Award. Her works have been published in the Rising Phoenix Review, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Sugar Rascals, and Black Napkin Press, and are forthcoming in Glass: A Journal of Poetry. This year, she also recovered from a broken ankle, helped open an art camp, and joined cross country.

In 2017, 2015’s Age 15 featured poet Odelia Fried‘s work was published in Window Cat Press, Blue Bonnet Review, Eunoia Review, and Baldhip Magazine. Over the summer Odelia was a Mechon Hadar Summer Fellow where she studied Talmud, Bible, and Jewish thought for six weeks. She returned to school for her senior year of high school with the jaded cynicism and cautious optimism of an aged circus performer. At the moment, she is waiting on college decision letters and fills the time by rereading Hamlet, completing schoolwork, and attempting to write poetry.

2017’s Age 19 featured poet Juniper Cruz continues to write poetry and Dungeons and Dragons modules in her free time while being a full time student at Kenyon College and working as an associate for the Kenyon Review. Currently, she has a poem in the forthcoming anthology, Halal If You Hear Me, n anthology edited by Fatimah Asghar and Safia Elhillo.

2016’s Age 15 featured poet Aidan Forster is now a senior in the writing program at the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities. In 2017, his work appeared in  BOAAT, Indiana Review, Pleiades, and Sixth Finch, and is forthcoming in Best New Poets 2017, Columbia Poetry Review, Ninth Letter, and Tin House. Aidan studied under Mary Ruefle at the Tin House Summer Workshop and attended The Home School’s literary intensive. He was a finalist for the Vinyl 45s Chapbook Contest and his debut chapbook of poems, Exit Pastoral, is forthcoming from YesYes Books in 2018. Find him on Twitter at @aforster26.

2017’s Age 18 featured poet Lucie Richter-Mahr started studying at the University of Edinburgh in September this year. She has found a huge number of places to sit and read and is very grateful for the city’s innumerable nooks. She has been visiting the museum, and reading Virginia Woolf. In 2018, she wants to practice writing poetry that is also visual art.

This past year, 2016’s Age 17 featured poet Margaret Zhang‘s poetry was published in SOFTBLOW, Glass Poetry Press, and Kweli. Her work is also forthcoming in Salt Hill Journal, the minnesota review, and |tap| magazine. She is now an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania and has spent the year trying to write more creative nonfiction.

In 2017, 2015’s Age 17 featured poet, Jordan Cutler-Tietjen has written about a devilish park, a vestigial library, and a queer spoken word group. He tells himself that he will write more in 2018. Fingers crossed!

PHEW. Told you so  – this Shiny Family turning it OUT. Looking forward to the next chapters for all our Teen Sequins poets, and looking forward to hearing more new teen voices in 2018! Onwards!

xo,

Sophie Klahr & Robby Auld

Teen Sequins co-editors