"Personal Velocity" organized by Katie Bennett. The series will feature personal stories (creative nonfiction/ memoir) by Philadelphia-based writers who identify as women, nonbinary, and trans.

This night’s readers include:

Kate Schneider is an artist, writer and therapist living and working in Philadelphia. Her books include Dew Drop Diary (F.I.N.E. Editions, 2021) and Headland (Fantagraphics, 2022). Her work has appeared in American Chordata and The Rumpus.

Alana Baum aka Lonzo wrote their most accurate bio at age four: "Sometimes, when my friends want to play games with me, I want to be by myself and talk about what I am." Very little has changed. You can find Lonzo's work in Argot Magazine, Yes Poetry, SWWIM, and Contemporary Verse 2. You can also find them making custom poems and erotica through their live writing practice, Soft Core Poetics. Beyond the art realm, Alana works as a sex and relationship therapist and trains medical providers in trans healthcare. 

sterling-elizabeth arcadia is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominated trans poet, DIY tattooer, and lover of birds, cats, and her friends, currently living in Philadelphia. Her work has been published in venues including HAD, New Delta Review, Poetry Online, and ANMLY. Her debut chapbook, Heaven, Ekphrasis, was published in February by Kith Books.

Stephanie Cawley is a poet in Philadelphia and a 2023 NEA Fellow. They are the author of My Heart But Not My Heart, winner of the Slope Book Prize chosen by Solmaz Sharif, and the chapbook A Wilderness from Gazing Grain Press. Poems and other writing appear in DIAGRAM, The Fanzine, TYPO, The Boston Review, and West Branch, among other places.