Em Dial is a queer, Black, Taiwanese, Japanese, and white, chronically ill writer born and raised in the Bay Area of California, currently living in Toronto, Ontario. Em is a Kundiman Fellow and recipient of the 2020 RBC/PEN Canada New Voices Award and 2019 Mary C. Mohr Poetry Award. Their work has been described by José Olivarez as poetry “that sings and staccatos before bursting into rapture.” Her captivating performances have brought her to venues across Turtle Island, from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art to the final stages of the Feminine Empowerment Movement Slam and College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational. They are a previous coach and team member of the Stanford slam team and an alumnus of the Stanford Spoken Word Collective, where their infatuation with poetry was born and nourished. Their work can be found in the Literary Review of Canada, Sonora Review, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, the forthcoming Permanent Record Anthology from Nightboat Books, and elsewhere. In The Key of Decay is Em’s debut book of poetry.
Em Dial
