My name is Dana Guthrie Martin. A writer, editor and poet, I share my home with my husband, Jon, and our beloved Chihuahua, Cricket “Miss B” Hayden. The three of us live in the Kansas City area.

My work has appeared or is forthcoming in numerous journals, including Alice Blue Review, Barrow Street, Boxcar Poetry Review, Failbetter, Fence, Knockout Literary Magazine, Stirring and Vinyl Poetry. The complete list appears under the journals tab. Sample poems appear under the sample poems tab.

My collections include Tomorrow I Will Love You at the Movies, co-authored with Jay Snodgrass (Hyacinth Girl Press, forthcoming), In the Space Where I Was (Hyacinth Girl Press, 2012), Toward What Is Awful (YesYes Books, 2012) and The Spare Room (Blood Pudding Press, 2009). The complete list appears under the collections tab.

I won the 2009 Blood Pudding Press chapbook prize, was a finalist in The 2013 New South Writing Contest in the poetry category, as judged by Marilyn Kallet, and was a finalist for Best of the Net 2008, as judged by Dorianne Laux. In addition, I was nominated for Pushcart Prize XXXVII: Best of the Small Presses, Best of the Net 2012, Best of the Net 2011 and Best New Poets 2009.

When I am not writing poetry, I spend my time teaching or participating in poetry classes, doing outreach work in my community, and editing Cascadia Review. You can find me tittering with joy because I get to see remarkable poems before they are published, trying to make room for just one more poetry collection on my already full bookshelves, and proselytizing about poetry near and far — even to those who claim they have no interest in poetry.

When I am not doing any of those things, you can find me exploring the land where I live so that I might more fully see, hear, smell and feel its strange and disquieting messages.

Thank you for reading This Life, Designed.