Kamden (they/she) was born in California and grew up on illegally seized territories of the Kingdom of Hawai’i. Before graduating high school, they earned a ten-thousand-dollar grant from the Davidson Institute, as well as support from The Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, the YoungArts Foundation, and Poetry Out Loud. They are an alumnus of The Punahou School, Sarah Lawrence College, The University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, The Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and, most recently, AmeriCorps. Kam’s BA in American Studies and MFA in Poetry inform their critical-creative practice. They specialize in American History, Politics, and Culture, Black Studies, Queer Theory, Ontology, and theories of human management. They are a recipient of Maytag, Teaching-Writing, and (post-graduate) Pfluflaught Fellowships from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Kam has also received support from The Davidson Institute, Sarah Lawrence College, The UCROSS Foundation, Callaloo, The Banff Centre, and The Black Warrior Review. Kam has published three chapbooks of poetry: distress tolerance, selection in the Ada Lovelace Innovative Chapbook Series (2016, Magic Helicopter Press), perceived distance from impact (2017, Black Lawrence Press), and henceforce: a travel poetic, finalist in Omnidawn Books Chapbook Prize (2019, Omnidawn Books). Kam’s debut full-length collection, MissSettl, is out from Nightboat Books; it won a 2023 Lambda Literary Award in Transgender Poetry. Poems, essays, reviews, and interviews can be found in Apartment Poetry, APT, Black Warrior Review, The Destroyer, Sixth Finch, Hobart, West Branch, Boaat Journal, The Journal, The Sakura Review, Juked, Protean Magazine, Prairie Schooner, and other sunspots. Currently they are a Faculty member at Choate Rosemary Hall where they direct the summer Writing Workshops.