MASS MoCA Opens Michael E. Smith’s The makings of you

BRENTON SIZWE ZOLA is a first-generation writer, interdisciplinary artist, and researcher. Informed by experiences of childhood homelessness, global travel, and a lineage of African spiritual leaders, his work examines themes of myth, spirit, and sanctity. His writing has appeared in Newsweek, Inc., American Theatre, Boulevard, Prism, and WBUR Boston, among others. He is a recipient of the Marianne Russo Award for a Novel-in-Progress at the Key West Literary Seminar, an Adult Fiction mentorship at The Word and his poem “Multiplicity” is one of the official poems of the City of Denver. 

MICHAEL JEROME PLUNKETT (he/him) served in the United States Marine Corps. He is the co-founder and Executive Director of the Literature of War Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to building libraries on military bases. He hosts its podcast, The LitWar Podcast. He led the Patrol Base Abbate Book Club. His writing has appeared in The Wrath-Bearing Tree, The War Horse, Leatherneck Magazine, Coffee or Die, Dirtbag Magazine, and Lethal Minds Journal. His debut novel, “Zone Rouge,” is forthcoming from UnnamedPress. 

IRENE JIANG is a Chinese-American filmmaker and writer of genre and literary fiction. She writes about unruly outsider women who navigate migration and aspiration with feminine rage. Her short fiction has been published or is forthcoming in Pinch Journal, Flash Fiction Magazine, Uncharted Magazine, and 101 Words, and her personal essays can be read in Joysauce and The New York Times. She is revising her first novel, “Immoral Purposes,” about a young Chinese woman in 1880s California who escapes sex trafficking and seeks revenge on her abusers. Irene is a Fulbright Morocco alum. 

THADDEUS HAAS has lived many different lives, from academic philosopher, to wildland firefighter, to acupuncturist, and in each one of these, writing has given him a way to make sense of his experience. It is only now, as he enters his fifth decade, that he has dared to think of himself as a writer. From a hamlet in Upstate New York, he spends his days working on an assortment of projects in between his son’s school drop offs and pickups. His current focus is a memoir of sorts about his years working as an elite wildland firefighter in Western Montana. 

MELENIE FREEDOM FLYNN is a writer, actor, and teacher. Her writing has been supported by fellowships from MacDowell, the Elizabeth George Foundation, Massachusetts Cultural Council, Djerassi Residents Artists Program, and Atlantic Center for the Arts. Melenie’s essay “Message from Your Inmate” won the annual nonfiction contest at Vela Magazine and her recent work can be seen in Provincetown Arts Magazine. A graduate of the MFA Acting Program at California Institute of the Arts, she has performed in theatres across the country. 

ZITE EZEH is a Nigerian-Kenyan-American writer, musician, and educator. Her recent literary work braids indigenous Igbo cosmologies with elements of today’s world. She is particularly interested in how her characters carve out slices of home for themselves—often against the backdrop of a world that has othered them. Currently, Zite is an MFA candidate in Fiction at UC Riverside and an incoming resident at Vermont Studio Center. They received the 2024 Abraham Polonsky Endowed Award, and their flash fiction piece, “The Ruins,” was published by Beyond Worlds magazine in 2023. 

MICHELE BOMBARDIER’s debut collection “What We Do” was a Washington Book Award finalist. She is the inaugural Poet Laureate of Bainbridge Island, Washington and the 2024 winner of the NORward Prize in Poetry. She has received fellowships from Hedgebrook, Mineral School, and the Tyrone Guthrie Centre. Recent work has appeared in JAMA, Atlanta Review, Parabola, New Ohio Review, Crab Creek Review, SWWIM, and others. Founder of Fishplate Poetry, Michele teaches workshops and leads retreats in support of humanitarian work, specifically medical care in the Middle East and Gaza. 

LIZZY BECK (she/her) lives with her family in Western Massachusetts. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Adroit Journal, Grist, Pleiades, Rhino, Tinderbox Poetry Journal and elsewhere. She is a graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and is at work on her first collection of poems.  

MASON WRAY is a poet from Georgia. A graduate of the MFA program at Ole Miss, his poems have appeared in Ploughshares, RHINO, New Ohio Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Diode, and others. He’s received support from organizations including Bread Loaf and the Hambidge Center. He serves as a poetry editor at Bear Review and lives in Atlanta.