Us
Bear Review People
Marcus Myers
Co-Founder + Co-Editor
Marcus Myers, originally from Hot Springs, Arkansas, lives in Kansas City, Missouri and works as an educator. A finalist in the 2019, 92nd Street Y’s Discovery Poetry Contest, his poems have appeared in or are forthcoming from The Common, The Cortland Review, The Florida Review, Hunger Mountain, Just Place, The Laurel Review, Mid-American Review, The National Poetry Review, RHINO, Salt Hill, Sink Review, Tar River Poetry, TYPO, Yes Poetry, Windfall Room and other journals. He has a chapbook Cloud Sanctum [A letter to my daughter] (Bottlecap Press, 2022) and is working on a full-length manuscript.
B Rivka Clifton
Co-Founder + Co-Editor
B Rivka Clifton is the author of Muzzle (forthcoming JackLeg Press). Their work can be found in: Pleiades, Guernica, Cincinnati Review, Salt Hill, Prairie Schooner, The Journal, and other such magazines. Rivka is an avid record collector and curator of curiosities.
Nikki Ummel
Co-Editor
Nikki Ummel is a queer artist, editor, and educator in New Orleans. Nikki has been published or has work forthcoming with Gulf Coast, The Georgia Review, Black Lawrence Press, and others. She is the 2022 recipient of the Leslie McGrath Poetry Prize and 2023 recipient of the Juxtaprose Poetry Award for her manuscript, Bloom. Nikki is the co-founder of LMNL, an arts organization focused on readings, workshops, and residencies. She has two poetry chapbooks, Hush (Belle Point Press, 2022) and Bayou Sonata (NOLA DNA, 2023), funded by the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation.
Mason Wray
Co-Editor
Mason Wray is a poet from Georgia. His poems appear in Best New Poets, West Branch, Kenyon Review, Ploughshares and elsewhere. He is a graduate of he MFA program at Ole Miss and has received support from orgnizations including Bread Loaf, The Hambidge Center and the Mount, Edith Wharton's Home. He lives in Atlanta.
Maggie Warren
Co-Editor
Margaret Kathryn Warren (Maggie) is a queer and disabled poet who writes about love and toads. They work as an adjunct English instructor. They earned their Master’s Degree of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and Media Arts in 2024 at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Their work has appeared in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Half Mystic Journal, Bear Review, and others, and their poem “To the Cane Toad” was a finalist for the 2025 Patty Friedmann Writing Contest. You can find more of their work at maggiewarren.com or here toadpoetmaggs
James King
Co-Editor
James King is a poet and editor from New Hampshire. His work has appeared in The Shore, Passages North, Exposition Review, and others. He holds an MFA and Certificate in Publishing from the University of North Carolina Wilmington. He is the 2020 recipient of the Academy of American Poets Prize from Dartmouth College, a finalist in the 2023 NC State Poetry Competition, and has been nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize. Instagram @jamn_king.
Quinn Franzen
Co-Editor
Quinn is an O'ahu-raised, Brooklyn-based actor, poet, and tutor. His poems are published or forthcoming in Poetry Magazine, Pleiades, Fugue, The Journal, Barrelhouse, and elsewhere. He was a Galway Kinnell Scholar at Community of Writers and received his MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. His acting work can be seen on TV, on- and off-Broadway, and in regional theaters across the country.
Claressinka Anderson
Co-Editor
Claressinka Anderson is a Los Angeles–based poet and writer. Born to Czech and American parents, Anderson was raised in London, England. Her poems and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Oxford Poetry, Los Angeles Review of Books, Best New Poets, North American Review, Boulevard, Pleiades, and elsewhere. Anderson is the winner of the Bear Review’s 2022 Michelle Boisseau Poetry Prize selected by Traci Brimhall. Through her ongoing collaborations with artists, her work engages the interstitial spaces of contemporary art, literature, and music. Anderson holds an MFA in writing and literature from Bennington College.
Jay Aja
Book Review Editor, Reader
Jay Aja (they / he) is a poet and comics artist. They identify as nonbinary, transgender queer, and second-generation-immigrant Guyanese. Jay’s word has been supported by the Tin House Summer Writers Workshop and the National Women’s Book Association. He has poetry forthcoming in Foglifter and has written poetry book reviews for Bear Review, Atticus Review, Saw Palm: Florida Literature and Art, and GRIFFEL. Find more of their poetry, comics, and book reviews on social media @comicsbhaijay
Mason D. Hochstatter
Web-Editor
Mason Hochstatter holds an MA in English from Northwest Missouri State University and works in KC as a graphic designer. He has work published in Medium Weight Forks and Sagebrush Review.
Board of Directors
B Rivka Clifton
Director
Andrew Johnson
Assistant Director
Marcus Myers
Treasurer
John Raux
Arts Advisor
Jordan Stempleman
Arts & Poetry Advisor
Jose Faus
Arts & Poetry Advisor
Hadara Bar-Nadav
Poetry Advisor
Former Editors & Readers
Haines Eason / Web Editor
Ruth Williams / Poetry Editor
Varbara Varanka / Poetry Editor
Callie Smith / Poetry & Art Editor
Andrew Reeves / Poetry Editor
John Elizabeth Stintzi / Poetry Editor
M. Cynthia Cheung / Poetry Editor
Anthony Procopio Ross / Poetry Editor
Alex Tretbar / Poetry Editor
Katherine Kallas / Art Editor
