Our 8th writer-in-residence for the year, Ash is a writer, editor and reviewer from Te Whanganui-a-Tara. They are the author of two collections of poetry, most recently How to Live With Mammals (Te Herenga Waka University Press, 2021), which won second place in the Laurel Prize. Their work has been published widely in Aotearoa and overseas, including in The Spinoff, Best New Zealand Poems, Starling, Sweet Mammalian, Sport, Landfall, Turbine | Kapohau, The Pantograph Punch, Cordite, and Peach Mag. Ash has an MA in Creative Writing from the International Institute of Modern Letters. They are a founding publisher and editor at Tender Press and reviews co-editor for Takahē.
Ash is working on their third collection of poems that will deal with the themes of a late 20s coming-of-age, particularly for someone exploring and trying to better understand their gender identity.