I received my MFA in poetry from Oregon State University after earning a BA in graphic design with a minor in English from Brigham Young University. My work has appeared in various journals, including Ninth Letter, The Common, Ruminate, Spillway, Tahoma Literary Review, Camas, Grist, and Longleaf Review.
In addition to nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, my poems have been finalists for the Orison Anthology Award and Palette Poetry’s Brush & Lyre Prize, and my manuscript Boy With Flowers in His Mouth was a finalist for the 2021 Orison Chapbook Prize.
I have also served as a poetry editor for the journal Halfway Down the Stairs since May 2021.
“In your poems, seeing is almost a form of homage, of devotion, and so also has a spiritual quality.”
— Karen Holmberg, MFA Thesis advisor
Background
Born in Utah, I am a person who feels more comfortable with mountains around me. They help me know where I am.
I’ve always been drawn to art. At a young age, I quickly gravitated to making art and, later, writing poems. I was fortunate to be able to explore visual arts, creative writing, dance, and music. I kept several sketchbooks and poetry notebooks. I had two desks in my bedroom, one devoted to art and the other to writing and my high-school studies.
During my senior year, I discovered graphic design and pursued that in college. A minor in English kept my poetry present, allowing me to continue holding art in one hand and writing in the other.
An MFA in creative writing took me to Oregon, where I fell in love with moss and crows and the old bridge over the Willamette River. I taught several college writing courses, including introduction to poetry. I obsessed over sunsets and reflections in dim windows, and I eventually completed a thesis collection of poems entitled Lightfall.
Oregon also helped me come out of the closet and embrace my identity as a gay man. First loves showed up in my poems, and I grappled with the complications of my religious upbringing. I met my husband Andrés—a kind-eyed, passionate therapist who loves dandelions and advocates fiercely for the LGBTQ+ community—and we got married in a hazelnut orchard.
Now, my husband and I currently live in a 100-year-old house in northern Utah. I work as a graphic designer and get to see the mountains every day.
