Simone Zapata is a poet, editor, and educator based in Oakland, CA. Her work has been supported with residencies and fellowships from Hedgebrook, Banff Centre, Community of Writers, and Miami Book Fair, and her writing can be found in Brink Literary Journal, Foglifter, Beloit Poetry Journal, Dilettante Army, and elsewhere. Simone holds an MFA from California Institute of the Arts, and she organizes with the SF/Bay Area chapter of the Editorial Freelancers Association.
PUBLICATIONS
2025 | “Nice Guys Finish Last” SWWIM Every Day
2025 | “Catching Up on Creative Process with Brink Literary Fellow Simone Zapata” Re: Views, Brink Literary Journal
2024 | “Wayward Taxonomies” Dilettante Army, Summer 2024
2024 | “we tell ourselves stories in order to live” sPARKLE & bLINK, Issue 117
2024 | “Deep Breath” Beloit Poetry Journal, Volume 73, Issue 2
2024 | “Required Transfusion” Brink Literary Journal, Issue 7
2023 | “we tell ourselves stories in order to live” Inverted Syntax, Issue 5
2023 | “My therapist asks me if I like myself” Inverted Syntax, Issue 5
2023 | “As Particulate Matter” Midnight Chem, Issue 1
2023 | “Spaces of Affect and Enormity: Angela Peñaredondo Interviewed by Simone Zapata” MAYDAY
2023 | “Reason for Consultation” The Vassar Review, Issue 8
2023 | “In the beginning we were waves” Reed Magazine, Issue 156
2023 | “Spray Paint” Spectrum Literary Journal, Volume 66
2023 | “Stone Sequence” Tiny Spoon, Issue 10
2022 | “A Cauldron of Bats” Foglifter Journal, Volume 7, Issue 2
AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS
2026 | Writer in Residence, Hedgebrook
2025 | Emerging Writer Fellowship in Poetry, Miami Book Fair
2024 | Poet & Author Fellowship, Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing
2024 | Patricia Clifford Scholarship, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity
2023 | Finalist, Adrienne Rich Award for Poetry, selected by Marie Howe
2023 | Emerging Writer Fellowship in Hybrid Writing, Brink Literary Journal
2023 | Finalist, Sublingua Prize for Poetry, Inverted Syntax
2023 | Burnett Miller Memorial Scholarship, Community of Writers
2022 | REEF Post-Graduate Fellowship, California Institute of the Arts
2021 | Finalist, Nightboat Poetry Prize, Nightboat Books
EXHIBITIONS
2025 | Required Transfusion
Solo Exhibition, Brink Literary Journal & University of Iowa, IA
2024 | Poetry in Parks
Group Exhibition, Quiet Lightning, China Camp State Park, CA
2022 | Tense Renderings: the will and won’t of spatial logics
Co-curated with Fía Benitez, The REEF, Los Angeles, CA
2021 | Voices Under Water
Solo Exhibition, WaveCave, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
2021 | Next Words
Group Exhibition, REDCAT, Los Angeles, CA
2021 | Come Sail Away
Group Exhibition, NeurOpera, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
2020 | Resonance, Instability & Witness
Group Exhibition, Discrepant Engagement: An Interdisciplinary Writing Symposium
California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
ZINES & ARTIST BOOKS
2026 | Sites of Encounter: An Ekphrastic Poetry Zine
Miami Book Fair & Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL
2025 | We Must Risk Delight
Miami Book Fair & Extra Virgin Press, Miami, FL
2023 | Collected Poems, edited by Sarah Sophia Yanni
Circa Festival, Los Angeles, CA
2022 | An Evening of Performance, edited by C. Bain
Los Angeles, CA
2020 | Until Further Notice, co-authored with Christine Imperial
California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
2018 | Standing Out
Chapter 510 & North Oakland Community Charter School, Oakland, CA
2018 | Home Is a Place
Chapter 510 & North Oakland Community Charter School, Oakland, CA
2018 | Mother of Gold
Chapter 510 & Acorn Elementary School, Oakland, CA
2018 | What Is Beneath
San José ZineCon, San José, CA
2018 | Body Channels, co-authored with Li Patron
Bay Area Queer Zine Festival, Oakland, CA
2016 | Notes from the Highway
South Bay DIY Zine Collective, San José, CA
2016 | Breaking the Ice
Cheers from the Wasteland, San José, CA
2016 | Names
Think and Die Thinking Collective, San José, CA