MFA Students

Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi attended UC Berkeley and Santa Clara University where he earned degrees in Psychology and English Literature and Creative Writing. He earned his Master’s degree from UC Davis where his poetics thesis was entitled “THE JOY OF HUMAN SACRIFICE.” He is a current graduate student of fiction writing at UC San Diego.

Nikolai writes surreal, energetic, sometimes rhythmic narratives.

Kara Ford-Martinez is the daughter of fourth generation New Orleanians, of which she is very proud. She grew up in Los Angeles and rural upstate New York. For the past three years she has been a substitute teacher in L.A., which has given her a lot of writing material. She is currently wrapping up a graphic short story called "In Her Nature" with the video game designer and artist Brian Allgeier. The story was inspired by a day spent substitute teaching seventh grade in Pacoima, California. Like many literary types, Kara has three cats. She writes fiction.

Amy Forrest has a BA in Art History from Dartmouth College. She likes to write fiction and is fascinated by the muddled ideals and desires that lie behind all of our choices. She lives in San Diego with her family.

K. Lorraine Graham is the author of Terminal Humming, (Edge Books), and her visual work has appeared in the Zaoem International Poetry Exhibition at the Minardschouwburg, Gent, Belgium, and the Infusoria visual poetry exhibition in Brussels. She has a BA in East Asian Studies and Chinese from George Washington University, an MA in English from Georgetown, and is currently a second-year student in the writing MFA program at UCSD. Her artistic and research interests include performance and embodiment, hybrid genres, poetry as pedagogy, and multi-lingual texts. As a child, Lorraine lived outside of the U.S. and moved frequently. She most recently moved from Washington, DC, so that's where she's currently from. She lives in Carlsbad, CA, with her partner Mark Wallace and Lester Young, a pacific parrotlet. You can find her online at spooksbyme.org.

Ryan Luz is a writer. He is also an avid photographer and musician. He currently lives in San Diego with his ocean, the Pacific. His photographs can be seen here, his music can be heard here, and his writing can be read here.

Keith McCleary grew up in western New York, studied film at NYU, and spent a number of years in Brooklyn doing graphic design, playing in bands, and making comic books. He moved to San Diego in 2010 and continues to write in various media, but he misses the guitars he left on the East Coast. Keith’s comics and graphic novels have been published by Terminal Press and Heavy Metal Magazine, and his short fiction has been featured in Flash as well as a number of literary blogs and ezines. He lives online at gchatus.tumblr.com and weirdthingsihavedone.squarespace.com.

Mandy is a recent graduate of the M.A. in Cultural Studies program at the University of Washington Bothell. The daughter of a Chilena poetess with an unnatural love of Neruda and Mistral, Mandy now incorporates a great deal of Chilean aesthetics and folklore into her writings. Her current research explores the dualistic and often problematic philosophies of pain, using language, especially poetry, as tools for engaging with experiences of physical suffering. Her poetry is available for viewing at the Clamor Literary Arts Journal, the 3:15 Experiment, and her personal blog.

Allie Moreno is a Filipino-American poet from San Diego. Her work tends to focus on issues of gender, race, social justice, and her life as a transracial adoptee and single mother. She blogs here: verballiearmed.wordpress.com.

Lester O’Connor writes in several genres in addition to video work and street propaganda. He has co-edited the pacific REVIEW and reviewed films for a defunct alt-weekly. He teaches for the Dimensions of Culture program at Marshall College.

Ben Segal is the author of 78 Stories (No Record Press) and co-editor of the anthology The Official Catalog of the Library of Potential Literature (Cow Heavy Books). His chapbooks Science Fiction Pornography and Weather Days were published by Publishing Genius and Mud Luscious Press, respectively, and his short fiction has appeared in or is forthcoming from various publications including Tarpaulin Sky, Gigantic, The Collagist, Eyeshot, and elimae. He has studied at Hampshire College and the European Graduate School and taught at Lincoln University.

Hanna is an artist in multiple media which causes her to focus her poetic efforts into painting images and composing music with words. She is obsessed with surrealism, nature, causes and effects of human cognitive functions, symbiosis, how nature and man interact, various sciences and technologies, and large scale catastrophe. These are the primary elements that fuel her creative processes. Her work can be found at nativewaters.wordpress.com.

Franciszka Voeltz believes in momentum, collaboration and you. She is interested in the power of naming things, the arbitrariness of borders and how bodies and geography carry history. Her poems have appeared in a number of publications including Flaneur Foundry, Ocho and Analecta Literary Journal. She leads writing workshops and builds performances and installations out of text. Engage with her work here.