Mission Statement

The term bombogenesis, colloquially ‘bomb cyclone,’ describes a rapidly intensifying weather system spurred by a steady drop in atmospheric pressure over a period of 24 hours. Founded in the midst of such a storm in January 2018, Bomb Cyclone addresses the rapid deterioration of global climate infrastructure and international relations over the previous year.

As a journal of art and literature, we provide a critical space for re-imagining our natural, built, and social environments as changing weather patterns, rising sea levels, and nuclear arms races intensify and become global existential threats. To that end, we are committed to uplifting and engaging marginalized voices through publishing poetry, prose, and literary translation by emerging and established writers alongside dynamic mixed media arts.

The nature of ecopoetics—a dialogue between land, air, water, and song—is unavoidably both personal and political, local and global. Environmental factors impact us according to other dimensions of our lives—including race, ethnicity, gender, class, and ability. At Bomb Cyclone we view ecopoetics through an intersectional, international, and interdisciplinary lens; patriarchy, white supremacy, and colonialism are environmental issues under late capitalism.

If your work investigates ethics of personhood, place, and identity, we want to read it. We especially seek submissions from women, queer and trans artists, artists of color, differently-abled artists, and those whose identities intersect with more than one of these margins.

Masthead

Aozora Brockman

Poetry, Prose, Translation

Aozora Brockman is a farmer-poet and essayist. She is the author of the chapbooks The Happiness of Dirt and Memory of a Girl, and is currently writing a linked essay collection on farming, climate change, and loss. She is a poetry MFA candidate at the University of Michigan. aozorabrockman.wordpress.com

Kinsey Cantrell

Poetry, Mixed Media | Events Team

Kinsey Cantrell is a Brooklyn-based poet. Her work appears in Anomaly, Datableed, New Delta Review, and elsewhere. She was a semi-finalist for the 92Y Discovery Contest and long-listed for the Disquiet Lit Prize, and she is on the Events and Social Media teams at VIDA: Women in Literary Arts. Her work often explores the relationship between neoliberalism and chronic illness, as well as the intelligiblity of invisible and at times undiagnosed conditions. She can be found online at kinseycantrell.com and on Twitter @kinseymads.

Valentine Conaty

Poetry, Mixed Media | Editor in Chief

Valentine Conaty is a Birmingham-grown artist and editor based in Queens. She has curated poetry and visual arts for Loose Change and founded Bomb Cyclone. At work, she supports poets, small presses, and literary nonprofits in planning events at Poets House—among the nation’s largest public poetry libraries. Recent work may be found in Anomaly, The Operating System’s Ex-Spec Po series, Glass Poetry’s Poets Resist series, and Petrichor. Find her on Twitter @queertrix.

Catty Donnelly

Poetry, Prose, Mixed Media | Art Director

Catty Donnelly is a voice actor, illustrator and composer from New York. They are currently working on a new musical, but it’s coming slowly, so don’t hold your breath or anything.

Phoebe Kaufman

Poetry, Prose | Events Team

Phoebe Kaufman, a recent graduate of Pomona College, writes about contemporary and medieval poetics, Jewish philosophy, and holes. She lives in Brooklyn and is currently employed.

Hannah Larrabee

Poetry, Prose | Social Media Team

Hannah Larrabee is a poet, science-geek, and former Mainer who grew up on a blueberry farm. Her first full-length collection, Wonder Tissue, won the 2018 Airlie Press Prize. Her chapbook Murmuration (Seven Kitchens Press) is part of the Robin Becker Series for LGBTQ poets. She’s had work appear in: Harpoon Review, Lambda Literary Spotlight, Rock & Sling, and elsewhere. Hannah was one of 22 artists selected by NASA to see the James Webb Space Telescope, and her JWST poems were displayed at Goddard Space Center. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of New Hampshire. hannahlarrabee.com

Amelea Ng

Poetry, Translation

Amelea Ying Ying Ng is a Chinese-Malaysian poet, multimedia artist, and educator. Formerly based in Shanghai, Portland, and NYC, Amelea currently lives and teaches in Perak, Malaysia.

Allya Yourish

Poetry, Prose

Allya Yourish is a poet and Fulbright grantee currently living in a small town in rural Malaysia. In daily life, she stumbles through the few words of Bahasa Melayu she knows and finds poetry in the constraints of her new vocabulary. Before being where she is today, she lived in Portland, Sarasota, and New York, in that order. She does not know where she will live next.