the
Midnight Draft
Poetry Collective
Poetry is often portrayed as an academic, even elitist art form, but it doesn't have to be! Words are free, and we should all have access to industry standard information. Collectives offer opportunities for writers to connect, forge new friendships, and provide resources for support, activism, and inspiration, and that's exactly what the Midnight Draft Poets aim to do for one another. Whether that looks like sharing our experiences with publishing or education, offering feedback on new works, helping promote poetry events, or even suggesting and discussing great reads, poets always do better when we work together!
Check out our current members below, visit one of our upcoming events, or browse the shop to see what our poets have recently published.
Interested in joining the collective?
Click this link to fill out an application form:
Meet our Members
Ivy Rozen
Ivy is an Asheville-based poet and free-expression advocate whose work has been published in Fine Art Globe, Chatham Life & Style Magazine, Education NC, Hot Pot Magazine, Penmen Review, Auvert Magazine, Loblolly Press, and Bottlecap Press. After her Free Verse residency in Vermont, Ivy studied creative writing with a focus in poetry at Southern New Hampshire University, where she received her undergraduate degree while serving in AmeriCorps. Previously the senior editor of Black Mountain Press, Ivy was selected to judge the Elon University Historic Neighborhood’s annual Primavera Poetry Contest for 2026, and now hosts the Midnight Draft Poetry Open Mic at The Argot Room every third Thursday.
Ezekiel Snyder
Ezekiel is an optimistic cynic, he likes to look at this disturbed world with rose tinted glasses from his home in Raleigh, NC. An incorrigible poet, Ezekiel enjoys writing poems that stab at the core of the human experience, the small moments often forgotten, the ones that build over years to make us who we are. When not writing or reading poems he enjoys existing in the sunlight, working on his project bike, and low balling people on Facebook marketplace. There's nothing more important in this world than art!
Jamie Zimerman
Jamie is a writer, performer, and sometimes a musician. He creates with the intention to explore the unknown with wide eyed wonder. Letting the blessing of uncertainty guide his voice in sharing whatever comes to mind.
Alia Vera
Alia and her poetry are inspired by the natural world, ecstatic experience, and the soul’s experience of being human. She is the founder of Sacred Poetry Circle and hosts poetry in the park on the first Sunday of each month at Haw Creek Park in Asheville.
Dylan Webster
Dylan lives and writes in the sweltering heat of Phoenix, AZ. He is author of the poetry collection, Dislocated (Quillkeepers Press, 2022), and his poetry and fiction have appeared, and are forthcoming, in several journals, including One Art: a journal of poetry, Pennine Platform, Amethyst Review, The Cannons Mouth by Cannon Poets Quarterly, Ballast Journal, Hush: A Journal of Noise, Wild Roof Journal, Hydration, Rise Phoenix College Journal, Ghost City Review, Resurrection Mag, 5enses Magazine, Last Leaves, and The Chamber Magazine. Dylan has also been included in anthologies by Quillkeeper Press, Neon Sunrise Publishing, and The Words Faire.
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Gray Lee
Gray (they/them), a native of Hickory, North Carolina, is an English and Creative Writing major at Lenoir-Rhyne University. A queer poet from Appalachia, Lee explores the influence of religious ideals on identity, expression, and lived experience. Through their work, Lee hopes to connect with and inspire other emerging writers and queer youth to understand that thriving is supremely better than merely surviving.
Justin Blackburn
Justin is a creator, life coach, viral slam poet, author, and comedian. Always connected to his spiritual sifts, Justin began giving Intuitive Psychic Readings at 22 years old at spiritual shops in the Southeast. From there, Justin was hired at different spiritual businesses such as Kimah Healing Art Center, Costa Rica Yoga Spa, and Willow Dreams as an Intuitive Healer. He has also led workshops and psychic readings at spiritual festivals throughout the south.
John Langmack
John is a poet and life coach who lives in Asheville. He published his first book of poems, God Bless the Roadkill, in 2022, and is publishing his second book this year. He works on Asheville's current longest running poetry slam with other members of Beasts of the Mountain.
Caleb Beissert
Caleb’s writing has appeared in International Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, Asheville Poetry Review, Red Earth Review, The Citron Review, New Native Press, and more. Beissert has been awarded grants from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Arts & Science Council for teaching poetry. Beissert is host of Poetry Open Mic Asheville, Artistic Director of Poetry Cabaret Collective, Co-editor of Redheaded Stepchild Magazine, and West Region Chair of the North Carolina Poetry Society’s Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series.
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Brin M. Wallace [MXBW]
A poet, visual artist and critical writer based in Atlanta; Brin studied Media Society and the Arts at SUNY Purchase in New York and Visual & Critical Studies at SAIC in Chicago. They taught critical theory, writing and studio art at MICA in Baltimore. At SUNY, they were focused on an anthropology of contemporary subcultures, ritual, and outsider art. At SAIC, they looked at queer theory, deconstructionist philosophy and poetics. Their work now explores text/context, money, liminal spaces, identity and resistance.
Kincaid Jenkins
Kincaid is an Appalachian author and artist who has traveled the world at large. He is a Pushcart Prize nominee for his work in The James Dickey Review. His work has appeared in Marrow Magazine and his contributions in Loblolly Press' Understory, WNC Saw's Holler Back, and YNST Magazine helped raise awareness and proceeds for the Hurricane Helene relief efforts in North Carolina. Currently he is a staff writer for Akula Media. His first book, titled Drinking With Others: Poetry By The Pint, is available from Redhawk Publications.
Jessica L. Walsh
Jessica is the author of Blowdown (Small Harbor, 2026) as well as Book of Gods and Grudges, The List of Last Tries, and How to Break My Neck. Her work has appeared on the Best American Poetry Blog and journals like RHINO, Painted Bride Quarterly, Indianapolis Review, Crab Creek Review, and many more. Her poems have been nominated several times for the Pushcart Prize, Best New Poets, and Best of the Net. She received a BA from Kalamazoo College and a PhD from University of Iowa. She currently lives outside of Chicago and teaches at a community college.
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Albert de Lorenzo
Albert is an artist, poet, and eccentric genius based in Western North Carolina, with several self-published collections of poetry, many of which revolve around dealing with death and processing grief.
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Charles Raffensperger
Charles is a poet and lover of the outdoors who currently resides in Black Mountain, NC, with his wife and dog. He enjoys exploring the many mountains and trails in western NC, and draws his inspiration from the natural beauty of the area. In addition to writing poetry, Charles is a long time runner, having run hundreds of races on trails and roads, and distances from 5k to 200 miles. His poems have been published in Ultrarunning and Eat Clean Run Dirty magazines. Charles has also written articles for Blue Ridge Outdoors, Ultrarunning, and Eat Clean Run Dirty magazines as well.
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Erin Moore
New to the world of poetry, Erin began writing as a way to cope with her anxiety. Now, after five years, poetry has become not only a hobby but a passion. Her work centers around relatable subject matter, such as love, loss, lust, and, of course, anxiety. Erin works as a full-time dental hygienist, and she hopes to hone her skills and eventually write a book. When she’s not writing, she enjoys hiking with her husband and two dogs.
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Tresha Faye Haefner
Tresha’s poetry has appeared in several journals and magazines, including Blood Lotus, Blue Mesa Review, The Cincinnati Review, Five South, Hunger Mountain, Mid-America Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Poet Lore, Prairie Schooner, Radar, Rattle, TinderBox and Up the Staircase Quarterly. Her work has garnered several accolades, including the 2011 Robert and Adele Schiff Poetry Prize, and a 2012, 2020, and 2021 nomination for a Pushcart. Her first manuscript, Pleasures of the Bear was a finalist for prizes from both Moon City Press and Glass Lyre Press, and was published by Pine Row Press under the title When the Moon Had Antlers in 2023.