BIOGRAPHY



Photo: Alexa René Rivera

Kailah Figueroa is a rhetorical engineer, memory archivist, and part-time prose stylist. Her writing is featured in Poetry Northwest, Black Warrior Review, Torch Literary Arts, The Cincinnati Review, Pigeon Pages, Prose Online, among others, with work forthcoming in Wildness and Ploughshares in 2025. 

Figueroa was a 2021 recipient of the Fulbright UK Summer Institute at the University of Bristol: Arts, Activism, and Social Justice. And in 2023, she was a Pushcart Prize nominee for her poem “After My Bipolar Diagnosis I Make Several Phone Calls and Everyone Says That Makes Sense” published in Torch Literary Arts.
In 2024, Figueroa was awarded a 4-week writing residency at Vermont Studio Center where she received the Civil Society Institute Fellowship, a prestigious award bestowed upon an individual who demonstrates exceptional creative talent and a commitment to their artistic practice. She is a Poetry MFA candidate at Rutgers-Newark '25 where she also teaches. She is currently working on her debut poetry collection and novel.

She likes karaoke, fresh flowers, Alice Coltrane, Ethel Cain, playing pool, reading by candle light, and vintage designer shoes. Her biggest wish and dream is for all her friends to live on the same street as her.

Instagram: @kailahfigueroa  Substack newsletter: The Saddest Girl in ______


Vermont Studio Center Public Reading in 2024
BIO (short): Kailah Figueroa is a rhetorical engineer, memory archivist, and part-time prose stylist. Her work has appeared in Poetry Northwest, The Cincinnati Review, Black Warrior Review, Pigeon Pages, Torch Literary Arts, with poems forthcoming in Wildness and Ploughshares. A Pushcart Prize nominee, she has been awarded fellowships from the Fulbright Commission and Vermont Studio Center.