Jess Rawling is a poet, interdisciplinary artist, educator, and life-long CT Valley Girl. She holds a BA from UMass and an MFA from SCSU and teaches Writing Seminars at Sacred Heart University when she isn’t buying art supplies she doesn’t need, starring in seedy puppet films, or playing gigs with her ukulele. Jess recently completed an artist residency on Martha’s Vineyard, is a recipient of a 2023 Artist Fellowship Grant with support from the Connecticut Office of the Arts, which also receives funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency, and is working on a folk opera and her first book of poetry.

Her poetry has been published in a “Beyond Queer Words International Anthology” by Beyond Words Literary Magazine, by the online journal Twin Pies Literary, and by the collaborative online journal Icebreakers Lit; the latter piece was nominated for the 2024 Best of the Net Awards through Sundress Publications. Her latest work is forthcoming in the 2024 Connecticut Literary Anthology by Woodhall Press.