We are a small, independent non-profit press. We are BIPOC founded and aim to publish what is unusual and work about in-between spaces. We are a nonprofit registered in Florida, and our 501(c)(3) status is pending with the IRS.
Our publications aim to highlight unexpected and wonderful places. We champion voices that might otherwise remain shadowed. We love work about the homes we make, wherever that might be, in the people we know, the homes we have made, the music we love, in the friends we make family. We are especially interested where creativity intersects with culture, be it cultural ancestry, skateboard culture, suburban culture, Queer culture, and everything in between.
We especially seek to amplify BIPOC and Queer voices.
Send us your best poetry, flash, fiction, non-fiction, and your weird, passionate, hybrid babies. Poetry and prose together, prose and art, work we have never seen before, work we couldn’t imagine exists. Surprise us!
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Yael Valencia Aldana
Editor in Chief
Art Director
She/her
Yael Valencia Aldana is the author of the chapbook Alien(s) (Bottlecap Press) and the forthcoming poetry collection Black Mestiza (University Press of Kentucky, 2025). She is the winner of the University Press of Kentucky New Poetry and Prose Series Prize 2023 in poetry. She is a Pushcart Prize winner, and her work has appeared in Torch Literary Arts, Stone Coast Review, South Florida Poetry Journal, and Cutbank Literary Journal, among others. She founded Purple Ink Press with Erik Ebright. She teaches creative writing at Florida International University. She lives in South Florida with her son and too many pets. https://linktr.ee/yaelwrites
Erik Ebright
Founding Editor
he/him
Erik Ebright is a UX designer and collaborative artist. He is inspired by better understanding of the world through information design. He loves to make interactive art books where the reader becomes a co-creator in the creative process. He has published several interactive art and travel books.
Alina Lugo
Managing Editor
Alina Lugo was born along the U.S.-Mexico border and currently lives in Houston, TX. Through creative writing workshops and public speaking, she has been heavily involved in intercultural communication and community outreach projects. She’s a freelance writer for Diáspora, an online cultural journal based in Guadalajara, México. Additionally, her professional experience includes writing consultancy and tutoring. She holds a master’s in World Cultures and Literatures from the University of Houston. In her spare time, she loves making handmade crafts and singing.
Madison Whatley
Senior Editor
she/her Madison is a South Florida poet and 2023 graduate of Florida International University’s MFA program. Her poetry has appeared in FreezeRay Poetry, SoFloPoJo, and Cola Literary Review. Her poetry manuscript was recently selected as a Semifinalist for the 2023 Berkshire Prize by Tupelo Press. She is a former Managing Editor of Gulf Stream Literary magazine. madisonwhatley.com
Valeria Rodriguez Flores
Associate Editor
Valeria is a student at Florida International University pursuing a major in English on the Creative Writing track and a minor in French. She has loved reading since she was seven and writing since she moved to the United States at fourteen. She has a never-ending list of books to read and is obsessed with endless fun facts.
Nina Chatel
Associate Editor
Nina is a student at Florida International University pursuing an English major on the literature track. She has loved reading and writing since she was seven after her second-grade teacher encouraged her. She aspires to become an English professor and a published author.
Jennifer Maritza McCauley
Guest Editor
Jennifer Maritza McCauley is a writer, poet, and university professor. She has been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts in prose, Kimbilio, CantoMundo, and the Sundress Academy for the Arts. She holds an MFA from Florida International University and a Ph.D. in creative writing and literature from the University of Missouri. She is the author of the cross-genre collection SCAR ON/SCAR OFF, the short story collection When Trying to Return Home, the poetry collection KINDS OF GRACE (‘24), and the NEON STEEL (2/26). SCAR ON/SCAR OFF received an Independent Publishers Book Award in poetry, and her story collection When Trying to Return Home was an Editors’ Choice from The New York Times, a Must Read of 2023 by the Chicago Public Library, a best fiction book of the year by Kirkus Reviews and Most-Anticipated by Today. You can find her at jennifermaritzamccauley.com
Jude Marr
Guest Editor
Jude Marr (he, him) is a Pushcart-nominated trans poet, editor and teacher. Jude’s full-length collection, We Know Each Other By Our Wounds, came out from Animal Heart Press in 2020, and he liked the press so much that he now works with them as an editor. Jude’s work has also appeared in many journals and anthologies, most recently Ghost City, Cutleaf, Reed Magazine, and Masculinity: An Anthology of Modern Voices (Broken Sleep Books, 2023.) Born in the UK, Jude lived in the US for ten years and is now planning a move to Portugal in 2025. Contact Jude via his website, judemarr.com
Trey Rhone
Guest Editor
Trey is a queer black southern writer and educator who hails from Augusta, Georgia, but now resides in Miami, Florida. He has earned an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida International University. He’s been published and has forthcoming publications in “Stirring,” “Mayday Magazine,” “Daily Drunk Magazine,” “Olney,” “BULL,” and “Broadsided Press.” If he isn’t ranting about the latest music releases, ask him to tell you a fun fact about his favorite animal, the possum.
