Extended Bio
for questions & queries
email Smith at ssyarberry at gmail dot com
email Smith at ssyarberry at gmail dot com
S. Yarberry is a trans poet and writer.
Their poems have appeared in, or are forthcoming in:
Guernica, The Robert Poems (excerpt), forthcoming 2023
Sequestrum, "My Own Heart," "An Apocalyptic Wanting, Wanting," and "Listen:,” forthcoming 2023
Dialogist, The Robert Poems (excerpt), forthcoming 2023
The Brooklyn Rail, “Desire, Joy, and Sadness in Spinoza’s P18,” 2023 (online)
Poetry Society, “Stage Directions,” 2022 (online)
Spectrum, “Tradition” & “Keyhole. Double. Batwing. Donut.” 2022, print
Hot Pink Mag, “A Romantic Sonnet,” “New York,” & Television Pilot,” 2022 (online)
Annulet: A Journal of Poetics, “Some Thoughts on the Monostich,” 2022 (essay, online)
AGNI, “Down Below,” 2021, print
Michigan Quarterly Review, The Robert Poems (excerpt), 2021 (online)
Ruminate, “A Kind of Lightning,” 2021 (online, best of the net nomination)
Pinwheel, “CHAPTER,” 2021 (online)
Redivider, “Island of Calypso” (previously, “Enter the Ghost”), 2020 (best of the net nomination)
The Afternoon Visitor, “Icarus” & “Terminal Theatre,” 2020, (online)
pulpmouth, “The History,” 2020, (online)
Sip Cup, “Self-Portrait” (previously, “Self-Portrait in Orthopedic Black Tie”), 2020, (online)
The Boiler, “Imagine,” “Requiem Circuit,” & “Boyhood,” 2020, (online, best of the net nomination)
echoverse, “The Sea Night Lilacs,” 2020, (online)
Tin House, “This place is called Beulah,” 2019, (online)
The Washington Post: The Lily Magazine, “Stepping Out,” 2019
jubilat (V. 34), “A cloak you cannot take off.,” 2019, print
Berkeley Poetry Review (V. 49), “Graphic,” “Anteroom,” & “Letter,” 2019, print
Best Buds! Collective, “The Cave,” 2019 (online)
Indiana Review (V. 41.1), “Sphinx,” 2019, print
Nat Brut, “You Having Been,” 2019, (online)
Sixth Finch, “Trans is Latin for across.,” 2019, (online)
DREGINALD, “I despair! I disengage.,” “Emanation Song,” & “Gesture Towards Immortality,” 2019, (online)
Burnside Review, “Automania,” 2019, print
Cape Cod Poetry Review, “Spiral House,” 2019, print
Notre Dame Review, Manifesto / Prologue & “In the Night Harbor,” 2019, print
The Offing, “Intimacy Abstract” & “I kiss the fire in your hands, or City-Builders,” 2018, (online)
FIVE:2:ONE’s #thesideshow, “McDonalds 3 Times” & “Angels in Conversation, 2017
Touchstone Magazine, “She started out as a flame-painting,” 2017, print
Their articles and interviews have appeared in BOMB magazine, The Adroit Journal, Annulet: A Journal of Poetics, and Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly. Smith’s fiction, an excerpt from their novella in-progress The Balloon Factory, can be read at 17th Street Review.
Smith’s first book of poems, A Boy in the City, is forthcoming from Deep Vellum. Details to come!
Their work is also anthologized in Queer Voices: Prose, Poetry, and Pride, from Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2019.
They graduated from Lewis & Clark College in 2016 and recently received their MFA in Poetry at Washington University in St. Louis, where they held the Junior Teaching Fellowship in Poetry (2019-2020). They are now a PhD candidate at Northwestern University, where they are a Mellon Cluster Fellow in Poetry & Poetics, studying twenty and twenty-first century receptions of William Blake. Their research specifically focuses on Blake’s revival in avant-garde circles that mobilize his poetry and legacy for political agendas in often conflicting nationalist contexts.
They have presented their research at the following conferences:
“Marginal Transmissions” with Analeah Rosen, &Now: New Writing Conference, 2018
“Marginal Transmissions” with Analeah Rosen, Crossing the Borders of Creation and Critique
Conference, Washington University in St. Louis, 2019
“I don’t know what are a body and hands a mouth a sex: Trans Poetry as a Basis for Trans
Poetics,” Berkeley Graduate Conference (Virtual), 2022
“Enough! Or Too Much: The Political Sermons of Ottobah Cugoano & William Blake,” International
Conference of Romanticism, 2022
“Transness, Transmutability, and Creation in William Blake’s The Book of Urizen,” Modern Language
Association in San Francisco, 2023
“Transness, Transmutability, and Creation in William Blake’s The Book of Urizen,” American Society for
Eighteenth-Century Studies in St. Louis, 2023
S. is currently the Poetry Editor of The Spectacle and the Poetry Coordinator at the MFA App Review. For questions regarding the MFA App Review, or to get involved, please email them at mfaappreview at gmail dot com.
They have taught undergrad at Washington University in St. Louis and Northwestern University. Additionally they’ve taught at The Fir Acres Creative Writing Workshop at Lewis & Clark College and The Loft Literary Center.
Past Readings
Pilsen Community Books with Jessica Laser, Chicago, 2023
Riffraff Books with Emily Pittinos, Providence, 2023
Beloit College introduced by Toby Altman, 2023
Poetry & Biscuits with Johannes Göransson & Keith Jones, Chicago, 2023
Northwestern University with Noa Fields, Stefania Gomez, and Allie Gibeily, 2022
Deep Vellum Books with Rebecca Wolff and Dara Barrois/Dixon, Virtual, 2022
The Changeling Queer Reading Series, St. Louis, 2022
Santa Barbara Public Library, Santa Barbara, 2022
City Lit Books with Caylin Capra-Thomas, Chicago, 2022
Deep Vellum Books with Caylin Capra-Thomas, Virtual, 2022
Skylight Books with Rosie Stockton & Ivana Baranova, Los Angeles, 2022
Next Chapter with Sun Yung Shin & Moheb Soliman, St. Paul, 2022
Trident Booksellers & Cafe with Miranda Popkey, Boston, 2022
Unameable Books with Alicia Mountain, Brooklyn, 2022
Pilsen Community Books with Toby Altman, Chicago, 2022
Skylark Bookshop with Caylin Capra-Thomas, Columbia (MO), 2022
Subterranean Books with Caylin Capra-Thomas, St. Louis, 2022
Exhibit B #12 (link), The Chicago Mosaic School, 2022
Open Door Reading Series: Xandria Phillips, S. Yarberry & kiki nicole- The Poetry Foundation (zoom), 2021
Boneshaker Books: Queer Voices Author Event, Minneapolis, 2019
Milkweed Books: S. Yarberry & S. Brook Corfman, Minneapolis, 2019
FOAM: S. Yarberry, Red Samaniego, & Matthew Klane, St. Louis, 2019
Berkeley Poetry Review Launch at Moe’s Books:
Sophia Dahlin, Angel Dominguez & S. Yarberry, 2019Invited Reader, Juicy Fruit Queer Gallery Show & Reading, St. Louis, MO, 2018
Invited Reader & Speaker, “The Body” Reading & Panel Discussion, Washington University School of Medicine, 2018
Invited Reader, Washington University in St. Louis LGBTQ+ Reading Series, 2017 & 2018
Invited Reader, The Loop Arts Festival, St. Louis, 2018
Invited Reader, Intermedia Arts Queer Reading Series, 2017
Invited Reader, 555 Reading, Minneapolis, 2017
Invited Reader, Twin Cities Poetry Festival, 2017
