J River Helms is a non-binary queer person from the south. They have an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Alabama and their writing has appeared in various print and online journals, including alice blue review, Copper Nickel, DIAGRAM, Fairy Tale Review, Ghost Ocean, Gertrude, New England Review, Phoebe, Sonora Review, and Word Riot. Their first poetry collection, Machines Like Us, was chosen by C. Dale Young as the winner of the Dzanc Poetry Collection Award and is available now from Dzanc Books. Their chapbook, The New Promise, is forthcoming from Tree Light Books in 2017. J lives in Brattleboro, VT.