Cai Quirk – New York, USA

Fromer guest editor for the MockingOwl Roost

Cai Quirk (they) is a trans and genderqueer multi-disciplinary artist who focuses on the intersection of gender diversity throughout history, its erasure, and its contemporary reclamation and re-story-ation. Cai’s poetry and photography series “Beyond Pink and Blue” uses metaphors of color to explore aspects of gender beyond binaries. Their self-portrait photography series and upcoming book, Transcendence, engages with connections between gender, mythology, and nature-based spirituality. In the spring of 2022 Cai received the Minnie Jane Scholarship and a four-month artist residency from the Pendle Hill Quaker Retreat Center. They received bachelor’s degrees in music and photography from Indiana University.

Follow Cai on their website or on Instagram.


L. Quattrochi – Illinois, USA

L. Quattrochi is a young adult writer with a passion for poetry, painting, baking, housecleaning, early childhood education, and music. She wants to try and learn a bit of everything. Having started her literary career by self-publishing, she is now working on a fictionalized memoir/autobiography. She writes poetry simply because it’s always inside her and it helps quiet the noise in her head.

Find L. on Teen Ink and Instagram.


Emily L Quint Freeman – California, USA

Emily L Quint Freeman is the author of the memoir, ‘Failure to Appear, Resistance, Identity and Loss’ (Blue Beacon Books) and non-fiction articles appearing in digital magazines including Salon, Narratively, Drizzle Review, Creation, The Mindful Word, The Gay & Lesbian Review, and Open Democracy.

Find more on Emily’s website.


Sally Quon – British Columbia, Canada

Sally Quon is a dirt-road diva and teller of tales, living in British Columbia, Canada. She has been shortlisted for Vallum Magazine’s Chapbook Prize two consecutive years and is an associate member of the League of Canadian Poets. Her personal blog is where she posts her back-country adventures and photos. She has been published in Chicken Soup for the Soul, Big-Stories About Life in a Plus Size Body and Writing For Life. Her first collection of poetry, Beauty, Born of Pain, was released in 2023.

Find more on Sally’s blog, website, Instagram, and Facebook.


Joshua Quirk – New York, USA

Joshua Quirk is an alien from the squirkalaxy. Existing primarily in order to float several inches above the sediment at all times, they juice eggs most days, as their hens are prolific. Kale and swiss chard spring forth from their soil, to which they add the egg-juice in a ferrous vessel to create lunch. Delicious usually, they pride themselves in their ability to generate it.

Sometimes they also make video games and write songs about how sorry they are for their existence.
Find Joshua on their website, Mastodon, and Twitter.