Gemini Ink

LitMinds Book Club
2025-05-14 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Mexico_City) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Join us for the LitMinds Book Club at Gemini Ink. We’re reading Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous.
Register
An instant New York Times Bestseller!
Longlisted for the 2019 National Book Award for Fiction, the Carnegie Medal in Fiction, the 2019 Aspen Words Literacy Prize, and the PEN/Hemingway Debut Novel Award
Shortlisted for the 2019 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize
“A lyrical work of self-discovery that’s shockingly intimate and insistently universal…Not so much briefly gorgeous as permanently stunning.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post
Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard.
With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.

Ocean Vuong is the author of the debut novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, out from Penguin Press (2019) and forthcoming in 12 other languages worldwide. He is also the author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection, Night Sky with Exit Wounds, a New York Times Top 10 Book of 2016, winner of the T.S. Eliot Prize, the Whiting Award, the Thom Gunn Award, and the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. A Ruth Lilly fellow from the Poetry Foundation, his honors include fellowships from the Lannan Foundation, the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, The Elizabeth George Foundation, The Academy of American Poets, and the Pushcart Prize.

Gemini Ink Author Reading & Open Mic Featuring Jonathan Fletcher
2025-05-08 18:30 - 20:00 | artistan craft bar, 402 Austin St., San Antonio, TX, 78215, United States
Come celebrate Jonathan Fletcher and his new chapbook, This Is My Body: Poems, winner of the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. He will be joined by poets Alex Z. Salinas and Jen Yáñez-Alaniz.
Following the featured reading, we will host a community open mic. Bring your poems, stories, and thoughts to share (there will be a 3-minute limit for each reader). Open mic sign-up will be in person starting at 6:00pm, so be sure to arrive on time!
Food trucks are available on site. All ages are welcome. Under 18 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.

Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Columbia University School of the Arts. His work has been featured in numerous literary journals and magazines, and he has won or placed in various literary contests. A Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best Microfiction nominee, he won Northwestern University Press’s Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize contest in 2023, for which his debut chapbook, This is My Body, was published in 2025. Currently, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow.

Alex Z. Salinas is the author of four volumes of poetry, most recently Hispanic Sonnets and Trash Poems. His book of stories, City Lights From the Upside Down, was included in the National Book Critics Circle’s Critical Notes. He lives in San Antonio, Texas. His debut novel, The Dream Life of Larry Rios, is forthcoming in 2025 through FlowerSong Press.

Jen Yáñez-Alaniz is a Chicana Cúelcahén Ndé scholar, poet, and community organizer whose work centers on cultural preservation, land-based ceremony, and decolonial epistemologies. Her poetry can be found in There is So Much I Want to Tell You (Mouthfeel Press) and Somos Xicanas (Riot of Roses Publishing House), as well as in various anthologies and journals. She is the author of Surrogate Eater (Alabrava Press) and the forthcoming chapter, “Catalyzing academic writing through notions of sensuality, surrogacy, and consumption as examined in the poetry of Surrogate Eater and selected translingual poems,” in Decolonizing Academic Writing through Translingualism: Walking the Talk (Routledge Publishing). Jen also authored a critical biography of Carmen Tafolla in Chicana Portraits (University of Arizona Press). Her current manuscript, Pain Theory: Sweetness Ferments into a Beast, reflects poetically and critically on healing, endurance, and living beyond multiple autoimmune conditions.

Writing an Identity Not Your Own with Alex Temblador
2025-05-06 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Tuesday(s), May 6 & 13, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, via Zoom
Nonmember $135 Member $115 Student $80
*EARN CPE’S
TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Do you want to craft diverse and dynamic characters with respect and care for their unique identities? What honest questions must you ask yourself when creating characters different from you? Let’s explore character creation in a thoughtful way!

In this two-session workshop, Mixed Latine award-winning author Alex Temblador of Writing An Identity Not Your Own will discuss one of the most contentious topics in creative writing: crafting a character whose identity is not your own. We will examine bias and how it might influence the text through stereotypes, harmful storyline tropes, character descriptions, dialogue, and more.
The class will also cover the history and state of diversity and representation in publishing. Then, we will discuss how a writer might approach writing main, secondary, and tertiary characters who have historically marginalized identities, including race and ethnicity, sexual and romantic orientation, gender identity, disability, nationality, etc.
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

Awareness of how a writer’s own bias can appear in their creative writing
A list of considerations before you write, as you write, and in the editing process of character development
An introduction to using an intersectional identity approach to crafting characters

Alex Temblador is the Mixed Latine award-winning author of Writing An Identity Not Your Own, Half Outlaw, and Secrets of the Casa Rosada. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Oklahoma and is a contributor to Living Beyond Borders: Growing Up Mexican in America and Speculative Fiction for Dreamers: A Latinx Anthology. Her work has also appeared in PALABRITAS, D Magazine, and Colorado Review. Alex has taught creative writing seminars, workshops, and classes with the Women’s Fiction Writers Association, WritingWorkshops.com, the Writer’s League of Texas, and more, as well as spoken about diversity in the literary world with Macmillan Publishers, Texas Library Association, Abydos Learning Conference, and at many other festivals, conferences, and universities. Alex lives in Dallas, Texas, where she runs a literary panel series called LitTalk and is the Executive Director of Write Here DFW.
Social media links: IG and Twitter and Threads: @Alex_Temblador, https://www.facebook.com/alextemblador

(RESCHEDULED) Everything but the Kitchen Sink: Writing Hybrid Essays with ire’ne lara silva
2025-05-01 18:30 - 20:30
This workshop has been rescheduled to April 1, 2025 @ 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm CST, in-person at Gemini Ink

(Rescheduled from May 1, 8 & 15)
View the class here: https://geminiink.org/events/writing-hybrid-essays/

Open Writer's Labs
2025-04-28 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-03-31 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-02-24 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-01-27 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
These peer-driven workshops, held the last Monday of each month, are free and open to writers of all levels and focus on poetry, flash fiction, and short creative non-fiction.

Online Via Zoom
For the online workshop, sign up the day before the class to ensure you receive the Zoom link.
This workshop is facilitated by Kevin Ramos. Originally from the northeast, Kevin studied theater arts at Rutgers University and The University of Washington. He’s lived all over the country before making his home in San Antonio, Texas. Kevin has written several novels and short stories. Most recently, publishing a short memoir called Enough about addiction, mothers, and missing graves. And a novel, Hayley’s Sense of Fire (DLG Publishing Partners), a modern re-telling of the classic fairy tale, The Little Matchgirl.

In-Person at Gemini Ink

Join our in-person Open Writer’s Lab with Robert Allen at Gemini Ink’s office, 1111 Navarro St., San Antonio, TX 78205.
Robert Allen has worked as a librarian and an electrical contractor for most of his life. Many moons ago, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied poetry under David Wevill. Allen has been active in local writer’s groups and open mics, including the Sun Poets Society. He’s been published in The Ocotillo Review, the Texas Poetry Calendar, Voices de la Luna, di-verse-city, the San Antonio Express-News, and Poetry on the Move. In 2006, he started attending Gemini Ink’s free Monday night writing classes and has attended regularly ever since. With more than a decade of attending writers’ groups, classes, and open mics, he now co-facilitates Gemini Ink’s Open Writer’s Lab.
Parking at Gemini Ink
Gemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.

Teen Writing Circle with Daniel Ramirez
2025-04-26 12:00 - 13:30 | Online via Zoom
Register
Last Saturday of Every Month 12-1:30pm cst via Zoom
For ages 13-19 years old
Are you a teen who enjoys writing in their free time? Or are you someone who’s never had the chance to write on their own? If so, this Online Teen Writing Circle is for you!
In this once-a-month writing circle, teens will enjoy writing in a judgment free zone. We’ll break the ice with one another and perform various writing exercises. You are encouraged to share your work with your peers and get constructive feedback, but it is not required. Our only goal is to keep you writing!
This course is open to teen writers of any skill level.
Participants will leave the writing circle with:

New, unique written work
Listening and sharing experience
Constructive feedback to help improve their writing

Want to learn more about our Teen Writing Circle? Check out our Frequently Asked Questions!

Daniel Ramirez has been an educator for more than 15 years. After studying History in graduate school, he spent several years working in conservation programs with teenagers. His time as a Montessori educator revealed the power of combining creativity with learning and inspired him to explore his own creative practice. In addition to his longtime love of storytelling, he has developed interests in calligraphy, puppetry, poetry, and block printing. A San Antonio native, he spends his free time exploring the crystalline waters of Central Texas.

Three Poets Laureate Speak: An Evening Celebrating the Power of Poetry
2025-04-24 19:00 - 22:00 | The Little Carver Theater, 226 N Hackberry St, San Antonio, Texas, 78202
The Little Carver Civic Center
226 N Hackberry St, San Antonio, TX 78202
Please see parking information (link to map)
“This production is not a presentation of the Carver Community Cultural Center or the Carver Development Board.”
RSVP
Attendees who RSVP’d by April 15th will be guaranteed entry until 6:45 PM on April 24th. After that, entry will be available on a first-come, first-served basis until capacity is reached.
Don’t miss an unforgettable night showcasing three powerful women poets!
Celebrate National Poetry Month with a reading, discussion, and book signing with 2020-23 San Antonio Poet Laureate Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson, 2024 Texas Poet Laureate Amanda Johnston, and 2012-2014 U.S. Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey.

These three distinguished Black women poets will discuss the contributions of African-American writers today and their roles as advocates who use poetry to uplift their communities. Each of these literary leaders will discuss their own poetic journeys and represent their respective roles as the 2020-2023 San Antonio Poet Laureate, the 2024 Texas Poet Laureate, and, in the case of Ms. Trethewey, the 2012-2014 U.S. Poet Laureate and the 2007 Pulitzer Prize winner in Poetry. Slam champion and current Houston Poet Laureate, Aris Kian Brown, will bring her own magic to the night as our featured moderator. This event will highlight the unique role poetry can play in helping us ignite our creative voice.
Each of these poets breaks new ground and asks difficult questions through their work; questions that encourage empathy and resilience, while not shying away from the realities of being Black women writers in contemporary America. Join us for this intellectually engaging evening celebrating poetry and the transformative and joyful ways poetry impacts our communities.
Light refreshments will be served.

Panelists
Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson is a dynamic poet, singer, and spoken word artist from San Antonio, Texas. Known for her powerful performances and lyrical prowess, Sanderson has been a driving force in the local arts community, advocating for the power of words to inspire and heal. She served as the Poet Laureate of San Antonio (2020-2023), using her platform to uplift marginalized voices and foster creativity across the city. In 2021, she received an Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship for her legacy project, The Echo Project, which was featured on KLRN. Vocab’s debut book, She Lives In Music, was published by Flower Song Press (2020), and her albums are available for streaming on all music platforms. Her second collection of poems, The Seasoned Woman, is forthcoming from Gnashing Teeth Press. Her work, which blends poetry with music and activism, resonates deeply with audiences, addressing themes of social justice, love, and resilience.
Amanda Johnston, 2024 Texas Poet Laureate, is an acclaimed poet, educator, and advocate for social justice. She is the author of Another Way to Say Enter (Argus House Press 2017), and her poetry has been widely recognized for its emotional depth and unflinching exploration of identity, race, and gender. Johnston is the founder of Torch Literary Arts, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting the work of Black women and girls in literature. Named one of Blavity’s “13 Black Poets You Should Know,” Amanda’s work has been featured on Bill Moyers, the Poetry Society of America’s series “In Their Own Words,” The Moth Radio Hour, and the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day series. Her work has also appeared in numerous online and print publications, among them Callaloo, Poetry Magazine, Puerto del Sol, Muzzle, and the anthologies Furious Flower: Seeding the Future of African American Poetry and Women of Resistance: Poems for a New Feminism. With a passion for empowering others, she has taught creative writing in various settings and is a Cave Canem fellow. Johnston’s work continues to influence and inspire new and established voices in the literary world.
Natasha Trethewey is a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and former U.S. Poet Laureate (2012-14), who is celebrated for her profound exploration of history, memory, and identity. Born in Gulfport, Mississippi, Trethewey’s work often delves into the complexities of the American South, weaving together personal and collective histories. She is the author of several acclaimed collections, including Native Guard, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 2007. Having also served as the Poet Laureate of the State of Mississippi (2012-2016), she is the author of the New York Times bestseller Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir (2020); and a book of nonfiction, Beyond Katrina: A Meditation on the Mississippi Gulf Coast (2010). Trethewey’s lyrical and evocative poetry has earned her numerous accolades and a reputation as one of the most important voices in contemporary American literature. Her writing offers a powerful meditation on the intersection of race, trauma, and resilience.
Moderator
Aris Kian Brown is a Houston enthusiast and student of abolition. She ranked #2 in the 2023 Womxn of the World Poetry Slam and #1 at the 2024 Southern Fried Poetry Slam with her team Smoke Slam. Her poems are published with Button Poetry, West Branch, Obsidian Lit and elsewhere. She received her MFA from the University of Houston and currently serves as the 2023-2025 Houston Poet Laureate.

Cultivate Creative Resilience and Write Unforgettable Works with Jen Knox
2025-04-22 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Tuesday(s), April 22 & 29, 2025 from 6:30-8:30pm, CST via Zoom.
Nonmember $145 Member $125 Student $85
*EARN CPEs

Creative resilience means facing setbacks and moving forward in your artistry anyway. It means harnessing the energy tocreate what you feel called to produce. It means owning your journey completely as you share your art. But how do you manage the ups and downs of the writing life, tell your truths without injuring yourself, and keep your creative engine burning through it all?
In this two-part workshop, we will explore the many versions of creative block, from writer’s block to rejection letters, from tough critiques to typos to self-doubt. We will then combine writing and resiliency techniques to support an enduring creative practice while generating bold new work that only you can write.
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
What you can expect in this workshop:

A nurturing and fun space to explore your stories and poetry
Creative resilience techniques for writing through and about difficult times
Practice using these tools to generate authentic raw material
Feedback and an opportunity to share

Jen Knox is an award-winning author and lecturer at Ohio State University. Her fiction can be found in The Best Small Fictions, The Adirondack Review, Chicago Tribune, Istanbul Review, Literary Orphans, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Room Magazine, The Santa Fe Writers Project Quarterly, and The Saturday Evening Post, among over a hundred other publications. Jen’s books include We Arrive Uninvited (Steel Toe Books Award Winner in Prose) and The Glass City (Press Americana Prose Winner). She recently received grants from the Ohio Arts Council and the Greater Columbus Arts Council to work on a collection of essays about work, and her newest novel Chaos Magic, will be released by Kallisto Gaia Press in February 2025. www.jenknox.net
Links:
Instagram
Substack
Facebook

Veterans' Writing Collective with Sarah Colby
2025-04-16 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-03-19 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-02-19 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
The Veterans’ Writing Collective (VWC) encourages the art of writing in a workshop environment where participants are offered honest, positive, and constructive peer-to-peer and mentor feedback. The workshop is open to all active-duty military, veterans, retirees, and their immediate family members. Writers of all levels working in all genres are welcome.
The VWC meets monthly online via Zoom.
If you would like an invitation to this class, send an email to veteranscollective@geminiink.org

Sarah Colby was born in northern New Mexico and raised in the Rocky Mountains. She is married to a retired Army Chaplain and is mother to a son in the Navy. Sarah has an MFA in Creative Writing from Sierra Nevada College and an exuberant interest in making the ordinary luminous. Her war-time experiences have motivated her to be a voice for the mostly untold stories of families and loved ones during these years of protracted conflict. She is currently working on a manuscript of poems about her experiences as a military family member.

San Antonio Book Festival 2025
2025-04-12 09:00 - 17:00
Join us at the San Antonio Book Festival on Saturday, April 12, 2025, from 9 AM to 5 PM. Find us on Exhibitor’s Row (Augusta St), alongside other community organizations focused on literature, education, and culture..
The festival includes author presentations, panel discussions, book signings, activities for children and teens, and food trucks. It will showcase award-winning and bestselling authors such as Naomi Shihab Nye, Laila Lalami, Martín Espada, Tim Z, Hernandez, Diana López, Stephen Graham Jones, Nita Prose, Cristina Rivera Garza, and more. You can find a more complete list of authors on the festival’s website: San Antonio Book Festival.
Date: Saturday, April 12, 2025.
Time: 9 AM to 5 PM
Location: Central Library and UTSA Southwest Campus in downtown San Antonio.
Authors: The 2025 festival will feature over 100 local, regional, and national authors.
Cost: Free

The Poetics of You: An Intro to Poetry Workshop with Melissa Studdard
2025-04-07 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Monday(s), April 7, 14, 21 & 28, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, via Zoom
Nonmember $155 Member $130 Student $ 90
*EARN CPEs

Poetry has a way of shifting the way we view the world and ourselves, of transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary, of infusing the mundane with meaning. Ready to see life through a poetry lens?
In this four-session workshop, we’ll explore and review basic poetic concepts while working with prompts designed to unlock your own unique poetic gifts and subject matter. The Poetics of You will be a generative, supportive, and encouraging space to learn, experiment, and explore. In the weekly virtual meetings, we will study basic techniques, read sample poems, compose drafts, and share writings.
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this class with:

New drafts of poems
Understanding of basic poetic concepts
A sense of your own subject matter and unique abilities

Melissa Studdard writes poetry, fiction, song cycles, and libretti. Her most recent book is the poetry collection Dear Selection Committee (Jackleg Press). Her work has been featured by PBS, NPR, The New York Times, The Guardian, Ms. Magazine, the Best American Poetry blog, and the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series and has appeared in periodicals such as POETRY, Kenyon Review, and New England Review. Her Awards include the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, The Penn Review Poetry Prize, the Tom Howard Prize, the REELpoetry International Film Festival Audience Choice Award, and more. As a librettist/lyricist, she has had works commissioned by Aspen Music Festival, Wolf Trap, Yale Institute of Sacred Music, and the University of Michigan School of Music. With Kelli Russell Agodon, she co-hosts the YouTube poetry series Poems You Need. You can find her at www.melissastuddard.com and www.youtube.com/@PoemsYouNeed
Social media links: @melissastuddard
Learn about Cancellation & Refund Policies

Everything but the Kitchen Sink: A Workshop on Writing Hybrid Essays with ire’ne lara silva
2025-04-01 18:30 - 20:30 | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Tuesday(s), April 1, 8 & 15, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, in-person at Gemini Ink
(Rescheduled from May 1, 8 & 15)
Nonmember $150 Member $ 125 Student $90
*EARN CPEs

Are you a fan of essay writing who is bored to tears with the standard five-paragraph essays taught in school? Want to learn a new approach to essay writing that is fresh and fun? A hybrid essay crosses the boundaries of genre and can include elements of visual art, photography, found items and is pulled together by your voice.
In this three-week workshop, we will liberate our minds and recover from the trauma of the “school-essay” mentality by creating hybrid essays that engage the reader, reflect our realities, and push the limits of what an essay can be. Bring any projects or ideas you’re working on–memoirs, family histories, love letters, journals, or thoughts you want to share about life, art, history, spirit, geography, the world!
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

A fresh approach to gathering source material for essays
A first draft of one or more hybrid essays

ire’ne lara silva, 2023 Texas State Poet Laureate, is the author of five poetry collections, furia, Blood Sugar Canto, CUICACALLI/House of Song, FirstPoems, and the eaters of flowers; two chapbooks, Enduring Azucares and Hibiscus Tacos; a comic book, VENDAVAL; and a short story collection, flesh to bone, which won the Premio Aztlán. ire’ne is the recipient of a 2021 Tasajillo Writers Grant, a 2017 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant, the final Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Award, and the Fiction Finalist for AROHO’s 2013 Gift of Freedom Award. Most recently, ire’ne was awarded the 2021 Texas Institute of Letters Shrake Award for Best Short Nonfiction. Her second short story collection, the light of your body, will be published by Arte Publico Press in Spring 2025. http://www.irenelarasilva.wordpress.com
Social media links: Facebook: www.facebook.com/irenelarasilva, Instagram: @silvairenelara

Teen Writing Circle with Daniel Ramirez
2025-03-29 11:30 - 13:00, 2025-02-22 11:30 - 13:00 | Online via Zoom
Register
Last Saturday of Every Month 11:30am-1pm cst via Zoom
For ages 13-19 years old
Are you a teen who enjoys writing in their free time? Or are you someone who’s never had the chance to write on their own? If so, this Online Teen Writing Circle is for you!
In this once-a-month writing circle, teens will enjoy writing in a judgment free zone. We’ll break the ice with one another and perform various writing exercises. You are encouraged to share your work with your peers and get constructive feedback, but it is not required. Our only goal is to keep you writing!
This course is open to teen writers of any skill level.
Participants will leave the writing circle with:

New, unique written work
Listening and sharing experience
Constructive feedback to help improve their writing

Want to learn more about our Teen Writing Circle? Check out our Frequently Asked Questions!

Daniel Ramirez has been an educator for over 15 years. After studying History in grad school, he tromped around the outdoors doing conservation with teenagers. Spending time as a Montessori educator revealed the power of incorporating creativity with learning. Encouraging youth to tap into their creative abilities convinced him to discover his own. Since then, in addition to his original love of storytelling, he’s found a penchant for calligraphy, puppetry, poetry, and block printing. A San Antonio native, he explores the crystalline waters of Central Texas in his free time.

The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Melissa Studdard
2025-03-19 19:00 - 20:00 | Online via Zoom
Join us on Wednesday, March 19th, 2025 via Zoom for a conversation with Melissa Studdard, to discuss her new book, Dear Selection Committee (Jackleg Press). Moderated by Elena Karina Byrne.

(Virtual Readings Monthly @ 7pm CST)

RSVP
Sign up for Melissa Studdard’s class, The Poetics of You: An Intro to Poetry Workshop on Monday, April 7th!
“I buried // everything they told me to bury. Then, I dug it up again,” Melissa Studdard writes in Dear Selection Committee, an apt description of the work these poems do to unearth the incorrigible self and bury conventionality and its offspring, shame. The speaker revels in her largesse, claiming, in one poem’s title, she’s “Huge Like King Kong, Like Godzilla, Like Gulliver,” and that the “world is my diorama of a world,” and in another, that her honeymoon pictures are “the cover / of the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass.” All of this immensity, this grand unburying, is squeezed into the prosaic corseting structure of a job application, intensifying the split between tame and wild. Even her own birth is enacted with kinetic magnificence: “I broke the kingdom inside her, broke the gala / of horses straining to get out. I broke the dancehall // mirrors and even the gilded faucet handles. / I was a river that strong. Made for flooding.” Indeed, these poems are so desirous and animated that they spilled over the edges of the page and into my thirsty soul. “-Diane Seuss
“The poems in Dear Selection Committee say what I’ve always wanted to say in a job application (and what I’m thinking as I perform the role of Normal Job Person) but never had the guts. Melissa Studdard’s burn-it-down-radical honesty is elating af—exactly what I needed to read—but the poetic attentiveness, from the first page to the last, was the real thrill. At the heart of the cyclone, a dependable, deepening pulse of self preservation.” -Jennifer L. Knox
“In the universe of Melissa Studdard’s poems, both the speaker and the audience will always have their cake and eat it too. After all, “Life’s never dull when your name’s Melissa,” and oh my goddess, does Dear Selection Committee serve hard as a brilliant 21st-century take and critique of the epistolary, filled with infinite heart and infinite humor and infinite neon signs that point towards the larger-than-life nature of poetry. This is excess. This is extravagance. This is the definition of sensuality. Studdard has the tremendous gift of finding the center of every poem, giving us the whole damn thing.” -Dorothy Chan
Framed as a job application and bounding with associative leaps and surrealist underpinnings, Dear Selection Committee is a subversive, sexy love song to an endlessly messy self and the burning world it inhabits. Full of apostrophic power, these poems shift among registers of loss, desire, and joy as they wrestle with issues such as climate change, addiction, modern distractions, gender presentation, religious questioning, and the nature of pain. Dear Selection Committee attests that although life can feel like a bumpy cab ride to an interview for a job you feel uniquely unqualified for, if you lay aside the anxieties of self just long enough to peer out the window, you’ll see great beauty amidst the chaos.

Melissa Studdard is the author of five books, including the poetry collection I ATE THE COSMOS FOR BREAKFAST. Her work has been published or featured by places such as NPR, PBS, The New York Times, The Guardian, POETRY, Kenyon Review, Psychology Today, and New England Review. Her awards include The Poetry Society of America’s Lucille Medwick Memorial Award, The Penn Review Poetry Prize, the REEL Poetry Festival Audience Choice Award, the Tom Howard Prize, and more.

Moderator
A Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry recipient, Elena Karina Byrne served as a final judge for PEN’s “Best of the West” award, for the 2016-2018 Kate and Kingsley Tufts Poetry Awards, and for the international Laurel Prize in environmental poetry. Her five poetry collections include If This Makes You Nervous (Omnidawn, 2021). Poems, reviews, essays, and interviews can be found in POETRY, The Kenyon Review, The Paris Review, APR, Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day, Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, LA Review of Books, Plume anthologies, Reel Verse: Poems About the Movies, BOMB, and elsewhere. Former 12-year Regional Director of the Poetry Society of America, Elena now works as a freelance editor, lecturer, reviewer, and Programming Consultant & Poetry Stage Manager for The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books.

LitMinds Book Club
2025-03-12 18:30 - 20:00 | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Join us for the LitMinds Book Club at Gemini Ink. We’re reading The Family Izquierdo, by Rubén Degollado.
Register
A Kirkus Reviews Best Fiction Book of 2022
Longlisted for the PEN/Faulkner Award
A masterful debut that weaves together the lives of three generations of a Mexican American family bound by love, and a curse.
The tight-knit Izquierdo family is grappling with misfortunes none of them can explain. Their beloved patriarch has suffered from an emotional collapse and is dying; eldest son Gonzalo’s marriage is falling apart; daughter Dina, beleaguered by the fear that her nightmares are real, is a shut-in. When Gonzalo digs up a strange object in the backyard of the family home, the Izquierdos take it as proof that a jealous neighbor has cursed them―could this be the reason for all their troubles? As the Izquierdos face a distressing present and an uncertain future, they are sustained by the blood that binds them, a divine presence, and an abiding love for one another. Told in a series of soulful voices brimming with warmth and humor, The Family Izquierdo is a tender narrative of a family at a turning point.

Rubén Degollado’s work has appeared in Beloit Fiction Journal, Gulf Coast, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Image, and the anthologies: Bearing the Mystery, Nepantla Familias, and Living Beyond Borders: Growing Up Mexican in America. His debut novel Throw won the Texas Institute of Letters Best YA Book for 2020 along with several accolades and his second book, The Family Izquierdo, a literary novel, is a New York Times Editor’s Choice and a PEN/Faulkner Award longlisted book.

Floricantos y Tumbaos: A Panel on Latinx Music in Poetry
2025-03-06 18:30 - 20:30 | San Antonio Public Library, 600 Soledad, San Antonio, Texas, 78205
Join us as we explore the fusion of Latinx music and poetry at this Library of America event. This panel will feature Latinx poets discussing how Latin American musical traditions have inspired, shaped, and informed their creative work.
Our featured authors include flutist Excy Guardado (Ceiba ili), renowned poet Urayoán Noel, and hip-hop artist Marco Cervantes (Mex Step) all of whom will engage in a rich discussion with moderator Amalia Ortiz. Experience the talents of these artists who will share intimate renditions of their work.
Light refreshments will be served.
Parking
Parking is located directly south of Central Library in a multilevel parking garage. It’s free for the first 3 hours.

Panelists
Marco Cervantes, Mexstep, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio where he researches Black and Brown solidarity and cultural overlap. He also performs as a solo hip-hop artist and is a member of the group Third Root.
Excy Guardado is a cultural educator and Musician from Honduras, dedicated to connecting migrant communities, supporting Indigenous rights, and advocating for environmental justice. On stage, she is known as Ceiba ili, after the statuesque tree, la Ceiba, the Mayan tree of life. She lives with her niece, Excy Veronica. They share a love for music, dancing, and best of all, reading.
Urayoán Noel is the author of eight books of poetry, most recently Transversal (Arizona, 2021), named a Book of the Year by the New York Public Library and longlisted for the PEN Open Book Award. Noel’s other publications include the critical study In Visible Movement: Nuyorican Poetry from the Sixties to Slam (Iowa, 2014), winner of the LASA Latino Studies Book Award, and, as translator, No Budu Please by Wingston González (Ugly Duckling, 2018), adjacent islands by Nicole Cecilia Delgado (Ugly Duckling/DoubleCross/La Impresora, 2022), and Architecture of Dispersed Life: Selected Poetry by Pablo de Rokha (Shearsman, 2018), a finalist for the National Translation Award. A Letras Boricuas fellow in poetry, Noel has been a fellow and faculty at CantoMundo and the Macondo Writers Workshop and is an editorial advisor for Latino Poetry (Library of America) and a board member of the Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural Center. Originally from Río Piedras, Puerto Rico, Noel lives in the Bronx and serves as Director of Graduate Studies for NYU’s MFA in Creative Writing in Spanish and as editor-in-chief of Intervenxions (The Latinx Project).
Moderator
Amalia Ortiz is a Tejana spoken word performer, playwright, and author of 2 award-winning books of poetry. She was awarded the 2020 American Book Award for Oral Literature, and appeared on three seasons of Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry on HBO and the NAACP Image Awards on FOX. She was awarded a City of San Antonio Individual Artist Grant and most recently, her band, Las Hijas de la Madre, were awarded a Democratizing Racial Justice Artist Residency from the Mellon Foundation to complete their new project Diatribas Punk. Amalia received her MFA in Creative Writing from The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.

Prepare Your Story Idea for the Pitch of a Lifetime with Marilyn Atlas
2025-03-05 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Wednesday, March 5, 2025 & April 2, 6:30-8:30pm CST, via Zoom
Nonmember $160 Member $135 *No student rate available for this class*

Do you have a story or an idea that would make a compelling movie or television series? Are you ready to package your idea and make the pitch to television executives, but don’t know how to take the next step? Let’s get our stories together and get ready for the big pitch!
In this two-day workshop, talent/literary manager and producer Marilyn Atlas will teach you the tricks and tips it takes to make that professional pitch. She will cover how to distill the essence of your story into short, sharp, easily digestible bite-size parts that strike the right balance between brevity, colorful detail, and cliffhanging suspense. The class will also review common mistakes writers make when pitching, strategies for adapting your pitch to your target audience, and advice on how to use comparable titles of similar works to prove there is an audience for your work.
Students will build pitch decks and have the opportunity to receive feedback from Marilyn on how to tighten and reveal the idiosyncratic narrative thrust of their stories.
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
What you can expect in this workshop:

How to make a pitch deck
How to synthesize your story in an attention-grabbing way
An opportunity to pitch your idea to a Hollywood producer

Marilyn R Atlas is a Talent/Literary Manager and Producer. Among her credits as film producer are Real Women Have Curves for HBO, which won the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, A Certain Desire, starring Sam Waterston, and Echoes, which won the Gold Award at the Texas International Film Festival. She produced a movie at Lifetime, based on a YA book, airing in summer 2014, titled The Choking Game.
In live theater, Marilyn co-produced the West Coast premiere of the musical God Bless You Mr. Rosewater by Ashman and Menken (the writers of both Enchanted and Tangled). She also co-produced the Ovation award-winning play To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday, which was made into a film starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Peter Gallagher. She is currently developing a musical based on her Sundance-winning film Real Women Have Curves (originally produced by Marilyn for HBO), amongst other projects. She was involved in several writers’ debut books for HarperCollins, Grand Central Publishing, and Source Books. She is in development on the movie Lola Goes to Roma, amongst other projects. She has long been committed to projects that celebrate diversity.
Marilyn is a member of the National Association of Latino Independent Producers. Marilyn has spoken at various colleges, film festivals, and industry events on creating three-dimensional, non-stereotypical characters. She is the co-author of a relationship-based, screenwriting guide called Dating Your Character, about an organic approach to character creation for Stairway Press’s Summer 2015 catalog. She is also featured in the book Write Now! from Penguin/Tarcher.

Beyond the Blank Page: Introduction to Creative Writing with Christen Barrón
2025-02-24 18:30 - 20:30 | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Mondays, February 24 & March 3, 10, 17, 24, 31, 2025 6:30-8:30pm CST, in-person at Gemini Ink (6-week workshop)
Nonmember $155 Member $130 Student $90
*EARN CPE’S
TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Do you want to try creative writing but you don’t know where to begin? Or are you unsure if you want to try poetry, fiction, or anything else? Have you felt too intimidated to sign up for a Gemini Ink workshop? Then, this workshop is for you!
In this hands-on 6-week writing workshop, participants will receive a gentle and fun introduction into creative writing and opportunities to dabble in poetry, fiction, and nonfiction to see which one resonates most. This course is perfect for beginners or anyone looking to rediscover their creativity. At each interactive session, participants will generate new writing and will be encouraged to share their work with others.
This course is open to writers of all backgrounds and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

an understanding of the three main creative writing genres
new writing in three genres (poetry, creative nonfiction, and fiction)
strategies and techniques for accessing creativity and overcoming writer’s block
resources for continuing a creative writing practice in the genre of choice

Learn more about Christen at her Writer’s Desk!

Christen Barrón is a creative nonfiction writer, editor, and writing instructor. Originally from Savannah, Georgia, Christen holds an M.F.A. in Writing and a B.F.A. in Dramatic Writing from Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). She currently teaches first-year writing and creative writing at Texas A&M-University San Antonio. For nearly a decade, Christen taught community creative writing classes for The Deep Center’s nationally-recognized Young Author Project and she has served as a Teaching Artist for Gemini Ink since 2017. Christen’s writing has appeared in YARN Literary Review, Black Fox Literary Magazine, Document, and The Journal of Writing Assessment. She is a faculty supervising editor for Mosaic, a student-led literary magazine at Texas A&M-University San Antonio.

Open House: New Year, New Writing Adventures
2025-02-20 18:30 - 20:30 | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Please Join us on Thursday, February 20th at 6:30pm CST for our open house to rev up your creative engines for the new year! We are excited to introduce our dynamic roster of teaching artists who can help take your writing to the next level.
Come connect with talented writers from San Antonio and beyond as they share new work and discuss the classes they’ll be teaching.
It all happens at Gemini Ink’s downtown writing arts center at 1111 Navarro Street. Don’t leave without our spring calendar of classes and events!

The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Octavio Quintanilla
2025-02-19 19:00 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Join us on Wednesday, Feb 19th, 2025 via Zoom for a conversation with Octavio Quintanilla, to discuss his new book, Las Horas Imposibles / The Impossible Hours (University of Arizona Press); moderated by Monique Quintana.

Brought to you by WritingWorkshops.com and Gemini Ink.
(Virtual Readings Monthly @ 7pm CST)
RSVP
“‘I want to think where I’m going will be free of borders,’ Quintanilla writes. These poems—informed by an artist’s eye, the art shifted by a poet’s vision—refuse to ignore thresholds, strange angles, and blockades. We lodge in tight corners and find prayers emerge from line and shadow.”
—Lauren Camp, New Mexico Poet Laureate and author of In Old Sky: Poems Inspired by the Grand Canyon
“Las Horas Imposibles / The Impossible Hours pushes against itself and ruptures the poetic grids inhabited by beasts, storms, scarecrows, black cows, neighbors digging graves at night, and poems that dismantle the physical and psychological structure of our realities. It invites us to confront our own mortality, and bears witness to the testimonies of rage and hope tattooed on our flesh/spirit.”
—Elizabeth Torres, winner of the 2022 Ambroggio Prize for Lotería: Nocturnal Sweepstakes
“With alacrity and wit, the poet pokes and jokes at life and the elements that make human existence a conundrum.”
—Norma E. Cantú, author of Chicana Portraits: Critical Biographies of Twelve Chicana Writers
In Las Horas Imposibles / The Impossible Hours, Octavio Quintanilla takes us on a profound journey to witness what it means to erase those boundaries devised by genre and politics intent on stifling memory, imagination, and creativity.
Presented in Spanish with English translations, this poetry collection comprises lyric and concrete poems—or frontextos—that explore intimacy and different shades of violence as a means to reconcile the speaker’s sense of belonging in the world. From the opening poem to the last in the first section, Quintanilla captures the perilous journeys that migrants undertake crossing borders as well as the paths that lovers forge to meet their endless longing. These themes are skillfully woven by Quintanilla, guiding us back and forth across the Rio Grande to encounter the apparitions of the disappeared and to witness the willingness of many to risk life and limb for a better life. The second half of the collection is one long poem, a letter addressed to a lost lover who will never get to read the speaker’s secret thoughts. Haunted by loss—of parents, of children, of the self—the speaker reaches an inevitable epiphany: “[A]nd sometimes it’s hard to know / on which side of the river I stand.” Stylistically, these poems destabilize our notions and expectations of genre and lyricism.
Las Horas Imposibles / The Impossible Hours is more than just an exercise in poetic virtuosity; it is an excavation into the complexities of what it means to be a human being in our contemporary world.

Octavio Quintanilla is the author of the poetry collections If I Go Missing and The Book of Wounded Sparrows. He served as the 2018–2020 Poet Laureate of San Antonio, Texas. His visual work has been exhibited in numerous spaces, including the Mexican Cultural Institute in San Antonio, the El Paso Museum of Art, the Southwest School of Art, Presa House Gallery, the Brownsville Museum of Fine Art, and the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center / Black Box Theater in Austin, Texas. Octavio is the founder and director of the Literature and Arts Festival and VersoFrontera and the founder and publisher of Alabrava Press. Octavio holds a PhD from the University of North Texas and is the regional editor for Texas Books in Review. He is the recipient of the Nebrija Creadores Scholarship, which allowed him a month-long residency at the Instituto Franklin at Alcalá University in Alcalá de Henares, Spain. He teaches literature and creative writing in the MA/MFA program at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas.

Moderator
Monique Quintana is the author of Cenote City (Clash Books, 2019). Her work has been supported by Yaddo, The Community of Writers, Sundress Academy for the Arts, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center, and Storyknife. You can find her at moniquequintana.com

Story Core with Rubén Degollado
2025-02-18 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Tuesday(s), February 18, 25 & March 4, 11, 18, 25, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, via Zoom
Nonmember $155 Member $135 Student $95
*EARN CPE’S

Get down to the core of a fantastic story! Understanding how setting, plot, and character are inextricably linked is vital to creating immersive narratives that keep the reader invested through to the last page.
In this six-session generative virtual workshop, participants will begin by exploring examples of the core elements of setting, plot, and characters working well together to create a cohesive storyline. We will do pre-writing exercises focused on drafting complicated characters who connect to the reader’s emotions and make them want to keep reading. Then we will move through a series of setting exercises that build the details of place and transport the reader there. This generative work will prime writers for creating memorable stories with believable characters navigating the worlds they inhabit.
This course is open to fiction writers of all backgrounds and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

A character empathy map
A full character profile
A developed setting for their story

Join us for the Lit Minds Book Club on March 12! We’re reading The Family Izquierdo, by Rubén Degollado.
Read Rubén’s Writer’s Desk Q&A!

Rubén Degollado’s work has appeared or been featured in Texas Highways, Literary Hub, CRAFT, The Common, The Rumpus, Image Journal, and elsewhere. His first novel Throw won the Texas Institute of Letters Best Young Adult book for 2020. His debut literary novel The Family Izquierdo is a New York Times Book Review editor’s choice and a long list title for the PEN/Faulkner and Mark Twain American Voice in Literature awards. Rubén lives and writes along the southern border, in the Río Grande Valley of Texas.

From Story to Song: Crafting Memorable Lyrics with Nathan Brown
2025-02-11 18:30 - 20:30 | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Tue-Thu, February 11-13, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, in-person at Gemini Ink
Nonmember $140 Member $120 Student $85

Every song is a story waiting to be sung. Join us for an immersive songwriting experience where we explore the art of storytelling through music!
In this three-day workshop, we’ll compare and contrast the worlds of story and songwriting, uncovering their similarities and differences while discussing what makes a song lyric unforgettable. Then, we’ll use real-world examples to highlight the rich narratives that live behind some well-known tunes that we love.
Using a hands-on approach we will guide you through the process of drafting your own story, identifying “leaping lines” that spark inspiration. We’ll examine how specific story details can elevate lyrics, focusing on practical techniques rather than theoretical concepts. And we’ll explore the significance of space, repetition, and emotional resonance with your lyrics.
Whether you aim to evoke emotion, tell a story, or create a connection with your audience, this workshop is the perfect place to start your journey. Come ready to write, share, and discover the song within your story!
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

An understanding of how to weave compelling stories into your song
Tools and techniques to make your lyrics shine
A first draft of a new song

Nathan Brown is an accomplished poet and songwriter who has performed readings and concerts from the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association in Long Island, NY to the Sisters Folk Festival in Oregon, the Woody Guthrie Festival in Okemah, Oklahoma, and Sultan’s Pool just outside the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem in Israel, to name a few. He’s taught writing workshops from the famous Blue Rock Artist Ranch and Studio near Austin to the Everwood Farmstead in Wisconsin, and the Descanso Writers Retreats in Tuscany and Ireland. His performances of poetry have been likened to musical concerts, and, in fact, he now makes a good part of his living from house concerts and live shows that combine songs and poems.

Uncovering the Whole Self: Create Poetic Self-Portraits with Ayokunle Falomo
2025-02-03 18:30 - 20:30 | Online via Zoom
Monday(s), February 3 & 10, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm, CST, via Zoom
Nonmember $135 Member $115 Student $80
*EARN CPE’S
ONE SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Everything in the world that we touch, smell, see, taste, or hear is a mirror reflecting us, if we dare to look closely. Despite this truth, the world (sometimes violently) demands we hide who we are. How do we bring our whole selves to the page, especially when it feels dangerous to do so?
In this two-session workshop, we will use works of art by revered artists like Frida Kahlo plus poems by Safia Elhillo, Chen Chen, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Tarfia Faizullah to generate new work through the lens of self-reflection. Participants will also use writing prompts to reflect deeply on who they are. What new truths will be discovered, or uncovered, about the self? How will you use these exercises to shape poems that are honest and vulnerable?
This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.
Students will leave this workshop with:

At least two drafts of new written work and one revised draft
New close reading techniques and critical observation skills
Strategies to overcome fears when it comes to writing about the vulnerable

Ayokunle Falomo is Nigerian, American, and the author of Autobiomythography of (Alice James Books, 2024), AFRICANAMERICAN’T (FlowerSong Press, 2022—finalist for Texas Institute of Letters’ Helen C. Smith Memorial Award for Best Book of Poetry), two self-published collections and African, American (New Delta Review, 2019; selected by Selah Saterstrom as the winner of New Delta Review’s 8th annual chapbook contest). A recipient of fellowships from Vermont Studio Center, MacDowell, and the University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers’ Program, where he obtained his MFA in Creative Writing—Poetry, his work has been anthologized and widely published.

Live Storytelling: Voices of San Anto Showcase
2025-02-01 14:00 - 16:00 | San Antonio Public Library, 600 Soledad, San Antonio, Texas, 78205
You’re invited to a live storytelling show featuring students from our Voices of San Anto Bilingual Storytelling workshop!
Students from our workshop, led by local actor, performer, and artist Marisela Barrera, will share deeply personal stories. Each participant will read a 5-7 minute piece about a significant moment in their life.
Come experience the power of live storytelling and hear these moving narratives firsthand.
We hope you can join us!
