Brook Bhagat

The event I’ve been organizing for almost a year is almost here! Pikes Peak Poet Laureate Ashley Cornelius is coming to Pikes Peak State College on Thurs., Mar. 23. Ashley is an award-winning, nationally recognized spoken word artist and speaker committed to using her voice to uplift marginalized communities. The evening will begin with refreshments and hot drinks at 5:30 in the Art Gallery at Studio West downtown, featuring the “Latinx Voices” art show. The reading begins at 6 pm in the Studio West black box theater with PPSC students, faculty, and members of The Nearby Universe, the writers’ group for faculty and staff I founded and have been facilitating for over five years. At 7 pm, Ashley Cornelius takes the stage! Finally, at 8, we’ll pull the winners of the book raffle. Winners get to choose from fantasy, sci-fi, poetry, and signed faculty publications, including my poetry/flash fiction collection, Only Flying. Free and open to the public. If you can’t make it in person, we’ll be streaming, too–scan the QR code on the flyer to pre-register. Join us!

I’m so proud to be a featured author in the gorgeous fall issue of The Dribble Drabble Review! Two 50-word prose poems and two 100-word ones were published here today; three of the four are adapted from pieces in Only Flying. TDDR has been recognized by the Communicator Awards and is a 2021 International Webby Awards honoree. The fall issue is full of stunning images and some of the most sublime microfiction around: TDDR Fall 2022