I am a twenty-one-year-old poet, author, and storyteller based in Northern Virginia.
In May 2021, I graduated summa cum laude from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia with dual Bachelor of Arts degrees in English (Literature and Language; Creative Writing) and Communication Science and Social Inquiry. I take tremendous pride in calling myself a Hokie, and am endlessly grateful for the three most transformative years of my life (so far!) that I spent dreaming in the mountains of Appalachia.
I grew up in the suburbs of NoVA— Lake Ridge, specifically. My writing is deeply influenced by my sense of place, childhood, and the ’70s-style residential neighborhoods I collectively define as home. There’s something about spending eighteen years in one place. It’s maddening, magical, dizzying, and claustrophobic all at once. I have an intensely complicated relationship with the girl I used to be here, the girl lacking self-confidence yet always passionate about weaving words to create something beautiful.
Friends, family, readers, and reviewers alike have described my work as rooted in nostalgia, personal mythology, confessional in nature, and stylistically experimental. I’m a little obsessed with the past, and that reflects through the subject matter I gravitate toward: cultural identity, experiences with mental illness, love and loss, and the meaning of family, both biological and chosen.
My work has been recognized by the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards in the D.C. Metro region, receiving multiple awards throughout my time at Woodbridge Senior High School (Class of 2018). I have been published in various editions of Eddas (WSHS) and Silhouette (VT) literary magazines. In 2020, I was featured as a local artist and innovator by PW Perspective, a media publication focused on showcasing the diverse voices of Prince William County, Virginia. In the same year, a collection of my poetry written during the COVID-19 pandemic was published in Mim Magazine. I was recognized as a Top 10 Finalist for the Giovanni-Steger Poetry Prize of Virginia Tech (sponsored by internationally renowned poet Nikki Giovanni) in the spring of 2021. My senior thesis on the Brontë sisters—specifically Charlotte—was published in Philologia, Virginia Tech’s undergraduate research journal operated by the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences. Prior to graduation, I won the English department’s 2021 Creative Writing Award for Fiction.
I just love writing. It’s my universe.
Okay, now for the fun stuff.
I’m a big animal person. I have the chubbiest calico cat named Glory. Also, though I swore I’d never become one of those dog moms, I caved and made an Instagram for my goldendoodle puppy Luigi. Seriously, check it out, he’s pretty freakin’ perfect.
I like to dabble in multimedia collage and digital art. It’s nothing too fancy, just a pastime of mine that allows me to explore poetic thought in a more visually focused way. You can find some of it here, on a little page I made to document the process of writing Cul-de-sac Angels. It’s essentially a stream of consciousness in grid form. Chaos and unfiltered thinking— that’s my jam.
Things that keep me afloat: curating weirdly specific Spotify playlists (link below— I’m into a lot of obscure/experimental indie stuff), reading 2-3 books a week, tending to my massive collection of houseplants, throwing myself bedroom/grocery store aisle dance parties, spending my hard-earned money on concert tickets, and going for long walks around town.
