BIPOC Reading Series March

Kyle Yoshioka thinks and writes a lot about belonging. He is the founder and editorial director of Provecho, a publication about the intersection of food and identity, and co-hosts the BIPOC Reading Series at Literary Arts. His writing projects have been supported by the Independent Publishing Resource Center, the McCormack Writing Center Workshop (formerly the Tin House Workshop), and the Andy Warhol Foundation's Precipice Fund. Kyle is working on his debut novel about a multigenerational Japanese American family that explores whether inheritance is destiny.

Kelly Novahom (she/her) is a queer Pilipino and Mexican American multidisciplinary artist, educator, community organizer, event producer, cultural worker, and a cofounder of the Queer & Trans Asian & Pacific Islander writing and movement project, Liminal Bodies. She is currently a student of prose, in the Independent Publishing Resource Center (IPRC) Portfolio Program and a Program Manager at Center for Community Engagement at Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling where her work strives to bring social justice focused continuing education opportunities to writers, educators, and counselors.

In the past, she has served as the Education & Community Programs Director for Shaking the Tree Theatre, organizing events on fight choreography, movement and intimacy direction. Other works include co-producing Coming Out & Overcoming with Theatre Diaspora and Artist Repertory Theatre, a storytelling project that seeks to provide connection and opportunity to center narratives around what it means to fully live in multiple identities as queer and trans Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI), and guest curating and co-producing events such as the APANO Annual East Portland Arts & Literary Festival and the Portland launch event for the Pilipinx Radical Imagination Reader with Whitenoise Project.

Ami Patel (she/her) is a 2023/2024 IPRC re/source resident and a 2024 Oregon Literary Fellow in Poetry. Ami's prints and poetry were a part of the 2025 MAC Gallery exhibit "Shift Work." Her poems can be found online and in print, including Beloit Poetry Journal, Tinderbox, and the anthology We The Gathered Heat: Asian American Pacific Islander Poetry, Performance, and Spoken Word. You can find her at amipatelwrites.com.