Tough Poets Review 02
Edited by Kathleen Cullen & Rick Schober
May 1, 2026
ISBN 9798234043887 / Paperback / 188 pages / $20.00

Carrying forward the momentum of our debut, Issue 02 features interviews with playwright and activist Karen Malpede (Radical Lives, Bright Deaths, 2025) and multi-award-winning interdisciplinary artist, filmmaker, and author Nihaarika Negi (Hunger, 2025), alongside new work from conceptual artist and composer Beatie Wolfe (imPRINTING, 2023–2026), artist and author Elberto Muller (Graffiti On Low or No Dollars, 2023), No Wave icon Lydia Lunch (Paradoxia: A Predator's Diary, 1999), poet and punk oral historian Gillian McCain (Please Kill Me, 1996), essayist/literary critic Sven Birkerts (The Gutenberg Elegies, 1994), multihyphenate visionary Dario Calmese (Institute of Black Imagination), visceral sculptor Kennedy Yanko (Epithets, 2025), and poet/DJ Juliana Huxtable (Mucus in My Pineal Gland, 2017).

Additional contributors:

Jess A, Solape Adetutu Adeyemi, Sharisa Aidukaitis, Olúwatúnmise Otolórìn Akìgbógun, Jean Akintoye, Paul atten Ash, Tom Barlow, Christian Barragan, Sarah Belli, Carolyn Maria Bevington, John Biscello, Amy Branson, Aaron Caycedo-Kimura, Clodagh Chapman, E. P. Daly, John Eustis Justin Evans, Jonathan Fletcher, Adria Frizzi, Lin Furio, Ashley Hasburgh, Wendell Hawken, Yuyu He, Ellena-Maria Kappos, Joseph Kerschbaum, Mark LaMonda, J. A. Lee, Andrés López, Al Maginnes, Michael Meyerhofer, Alan Murphy, Lance Nizami, Chad Norman, Godwin Obaji, Larry Parker, Pariya Pooladvand, Joseph Randolph, Otto Lara Resende, Christopher Rubio-Goldsmith, Yamuna Sauter, Erin Lee Shields, Polina Simonova, J. D. Smith, Willow Sommer, Heliana Stoichkova, Edward Michael Supranowicz, Kaz Sussman, Matthew Thorburn, Lauren Tivey, Kevin Tosca, Raya Tost, Edwin Vásquez, and Treat Williams

Cover photo: Kitten, Italy, 1936. Photograph by Herbert List (1903–1975). Courtesy of Magnum Photos.