Slapering Hol Press and HVWC Present the MFA Spotlight Reading

MFA Student Writers from Sarah Lawrence College:

Kerry Kurdziel lives in New York and is an MFA candidate at Sarah Lawrence College. Her work has appeared in Muzzle Magazine, Bear Review, Columbia Journal, and elsewhere. She is a winner of the 2025 SLC Poetry Festival Writing Contest judged by Rio Cortez, and was a finalist for the 2025 Ploughshares Emerging Writer Contest.

Marwa Daftani is an Afghan poet and writer currently pursuing an MFA at Sarah Lawrence College. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Rising Phoenix Review, Shō Poetry Journal, The Racket, Tell Me About the Dream, an anthology inspired by the work of Richard Siken, and elsewhere. When she is not writing, you can find her watching Al Pacino movies or contemplating the water. 

Mayzie Sattler (she/her) is a poet from Upstate New York. She is a second year MFA candidate at Sarah Lawrence College, where she serves as Poetry Editor for Lumina Journal and Co-Director of the Poetry Festival. Mayzie has read for Black Ocean and the Southampton Review, and is currently an intern for Black Lawrence Press. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Coffin Bell Journal, WILDsound Writing Festival, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Dodging The Rain. She was long-listed for the ONLY POEMS 2025 Poet of the Year Prize. She currently lives in Yonkers, NY.

Alia Shaukat is a Pakistani-American writer from Austin, Texas. She is an MFA Poetry student at Sarah Lawrence College and has earned a BA in English Literature, French Literature, and Environment from McGill University. Alia explores the intersection of art and social justice through her work as the DEIB Graduate Program Coordinator for Sarah Lawrence and a 2025-2026 Teaching Artist for the Community-Word Project. She also serves as Poetry Editor of Lumina Journal. Her poetry writes into heritage, love, girlhood, the body, and how they each intersect with the natural world. 

MFA Student Writers from Queens College:

Mundo Rivera is a Nuyorican writer and educator born and raised in East Harlem. His poems have been published in print and online publications, including No, Dear, The Acentos Review, Palabra and PoetsArtists, a multi-media journal that showcases poems paired with art. He was a 4-time regional workshop participant at Cave Canem and has attended artist-in-residence programs at Fundación Valparaiso in Mojacar, España and La Napoule Art Foundation near Cannes. Last spring, he was awarded the Rosenthal Archives Writing Fellowship in the Special Collections Department at Queens College. He has been teaching in New York City’s public schools for over 20 years and resides in Astoria, Queens.   

Cydni Thompson is a Black poet from Jamaica Queens. She is the current Poetry Coalition Fellow at The Poetry Society of America and is pursuing her MFA at Queens College. She’s got a recent poem in SWWIM Miami and is very happy to be here!

Chaim Wachsberger is a student at the Queens College Master of Fine Arts program, focusing on poetry. He is in his third year of study. Before joining the program, he had practiced law in Manhattan. He lives in Manhattan with his wife; his children move around a lot.  

Gianna Baez (she/ella) is a proud Dominicana from Inwood. A civil rights nonprofit employee by day and storyteller by night, Gianna is a multi-genre writer currently getting her MFA in poetry at Queens College. Her work largely explores identity, gender, diasporas, and conceptions of home. She reads to learn and writes to remember. Her dream is to publish and inspire her communities to share their stories, too.