Teachers

Kari Tai is founder of the artistic collective Home Ground. Her poetry and dancing inform the group’s artistic response. Kari grew up in Kalispell, Montana in a unique octagon house designed and built by her father. Her childhood experiences living on a rural, forested 20-acre lot under the Big Sky influence both her movement style and writing focus. “Choreopoetry” is how she likes to think of interplay between dancing and writing. Kari holds dual BA degrees in journalism and anthropology and a master’s degree in medical anthropology. Her dance experience ranges from her time as a professional dancer with the Spokane Ballet Company to sharing the joy of movement as a dance instructor with people with Parkinson’s Disease. Kari’s writing includes dance and book reviews for Flagstaff Live!, articles and essays in the Plateau Journal and the book The View from Here, and poetry in Spindrift as well as academic and professional writing. A proud mother of two young men, Kari lives near Lake Sammamish and has served as an art docent chair and on the Redmond Arts and Culture Commission. Connect with Kari at karimorehouse@hotmail.com, on Instagram @kari.tai, or www.taikari.com. 

Melissa Takai is an actor and artist based in Seattle. During the day, she works as a visual designer and by night, she studies acting at Freehold Theatre. Melissa is thrilled to be part of THE KINGS GO SOUTH cast!

Daniel Tam-Claiborne is a multiracial essayist and author of the short story collection What Never Leaves. His writing has appeared in Literary Hub, Off Assignment, The Rumpus, The Huffington Post, The Seventh Wave, and elsewhere. A 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow, he has also received fellowships and awards from the U.S. Fulbright Program, Kundiman, Writing By Writers, the Jack Straw Cultural Center, and others. Daniel holds degrees from Oberlin College, Yale University, and the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. 

Lucy Tan is the author of the novel What We Were Promised, which was longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and named a Best Book of 2018 by The Washington Post, Refinery 29, and Amazon. A recipient of fellowships from Kundiman and the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, Lucy is originally from New Jersey. She currently lives and writes in Seattle.

Yuki Tanaka was born and raised in Yamaguchi, Japan. He is the author of the debut poetry collection, Chronicle of Drifting (Copper Canyon Press, 2025). His poems have appeared in The New Republic, The Paris Review, Poetry, and elsewhere. He has also co-translated, with Mary Jo Bang, A Kiss for the Absolute: Selected Poems of Shuzo Takiguchi, published by Princeton University Press. He lives in Tokyo and teaches at Hosei University.

Danny Tayara is a mixed-race queer designer, filmmaker, animator, and illustrator. They received their B.A. in Film Studies from Seattle University, where they focused heavily on scientific film and XR. In addition to illustrating Clitaurus Chronicles, they also work in Seattle as Production & UX Research Director at VR Ulysses, a software startup company that develops technology solutions for cyber security and network operations. During their time as Festival Director of the Seattle Queer Film Festival, Danny founded Seattle Queer Filmmakers while also facilitating workshops and maintaining their creative practice making short films. Danny’s films have screened in fifteen countries, notable awards including Judge’s Pick at the UW Climate Change Film Festival, Most Controversial Film at Queersicht Film Festival, and Best Documentary at the Roving Eye International Film Festival.

The following could all apply to Stephanie Tayengco—technologist, writer, visual artist, excavator, historian, taxonomist, cartographer, motorcyclist, mariner, angler, and dog fancier. She endeavors to apply these modes of being to understanding her own Filipino-American identity, filling in ontological and historic holes, and making her own creative outlets for useful obsessions.

Tess Taylor, an avid gardener, is the author of five acclaimed collections of poetry including Work & Days, which was named one of the 10 best books of poetry of 2016 by the New York Times. Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Kenyon Review, Poetry, Tin House, The Times Literary Supplement, CNN, and the New York Times. She has also served as on-air poetry reviewer for NPR’s All Things Considered for over a decade. Taylor is local to the Bay Area where she tends to fruit trees and backyard chickens.

Michelle Tea is the author of over a dozen books, including Knocking Myself Up: A Memoir of My In/Fertility, forthcoming August 2022 from Dey Street/HarperCollins. She has been the recipient of awards from the Lambda Literary Foundation, The Rona Jaffe Foundation, the California Library Association, and PEN/America. She is a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow. Author of the popular tarot how-to, Modern Tarot, Tea is the host of the mystical podcasts Your Magic on Spotify and Ask the Tarot, on SpotifyGreenroom. 

Peter Temes is a writer, teacher and business advisor living in Seattle. He has taught writing, literature, and ethics at Harvard and Columbia Universities, and is an advisor to the University of Alabama. He lives in Seattle with his family.

Molly Tenenbaum is the author of five books of poems, most recently The Arborists (MoonPath, 2023); Mytheria (Two Sylvias, 2017); and The Cupboard Artist (Floating Bridge, 2012). Her chapbook/artist book, Exercises to Free the Tongue (2014), a collaboration with artist Ellen Ziegler, combines poems with archival materials about her vaudeville ventriloquist grandparents. Her recordings of old-time Appalachian banjo are Instead of a Pony and Goose & Gander. She lives in Seattle, having taught English at North Seattle College for 30+ years, currently teaching music in the backyard and at Dusty Strings Music School. Find her at www.mollytenenbaum.com. 

Ann Teplick is a poet, playwright, and prose writer with an MFA in creative writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. For twenty-three years, she’s been a teaching artist in Seattle public schools; Hugo House; Coyote Central; and Pongo Teen Writing, at King Co. juvenile detention and the Washington State psychiatric hospital. She has received funding from Seattle Office of Arts and Culture, 4 Culture, Artist Trust, and the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. She is also a Hedgebrook and Jack Straw alumna.

Jay Aquinas Thompson (he/they) is a poet, essayist, and teacher with recent or forthcoming work in Interim, Pacifica Literary Review, Passages North, COAST | NoCOAST, and Poetry Northwest, where they're a contributing editor. Their poem "Poor and Carefree Strangers," published in FIVES: a Companion to Denver Quarterly, was a 2021–2022 Best of the Net nominee, and they're a 2021 Tin House Workshop alum. They've been awarded grants and fellowships from the Ragdale Foundation, the Community of Writers, the Sustainable Arts Foundation, and King County 4Culture. They live with their child in Washington state, where they teach creative writing to public school students and incarcerated women. Twitter @jayaquinas; Instagram @freshwater_merman

Disabled writer, Jason M. Thornberry’s work appears in The Stranger, Los Angeles Review of Books, Letters Journal, and elsewhere. He overcame a traumatic brain injury. Relearning to walk and speak, Jason earned an MFA in Creative Writing from Chapman University. Go to https://jmthornberry.wordpress.com/ for more information. Or check out Jason's Twitter @thornberryjm.

L. Timmel Duchamp is the publisher of Aqueduct Press, which she founded in 2004. Her work has been on the Otherwise Honor list multiple times and a finalist for the Sturgeon, Nebula, Homer, and Sidewise awards. The five-volume Marq’ssan Cycle won a special Otherwise Award honor in 2009. In 2008 she appeared as a Guest of Honor at Wis­Con. In 2009-2010 she was awarded the Neil Clark Spe­cial Achievement Award (“recognizing individuals who are proactive behind the scenes but whose efforts often don’t receive the measure of public recognition they deserve”). In 2015 she was the Editor Guest at Arma­dillocon. She has been a finalist for the World Fantasy Award twice, for her work as a publisher and editor. She has taught at the Clarion West Writers Workshop as well as one-day Clarion West workshops. She lives in Seattle.