Guest Fiction Editor for Foglifter's 11.2 issue
Foglifter Journal
Read more →ApolloChastain
About
Either crying in the club
or crying in the archive
Apollo Chastain (he/they/she) is a transsexual poet, critic, and performance studies scholar based in Chicago and Saint Louis. Their poetry and criticism appears or is forthcoming in journals including Poets.org, the American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, and Washington Square Review. Apollo explores how the body and self are made mutable by exposure to the environment via sex work and transsexuality. They are curious about how labor modulates our consciousness and relationality with both living and dead kin across landscapes from Midwestern hotels to the trans archive.
They are the recipient of an Academy of American Poets College Prize, a nominee for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and an MFA candidate in poetry at Washington University in St. Louis. Their poetic and academic work has been supported by the McCormack Writing Center (Tin House) and the Smithsonian Institution. Beginning in the fall of 2026, they will pursue a PhD in Performance Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.
They have taught and facilitated undergraduate courses and workshops at Washington University in St. Louis and the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. They tutored at the Missouri Eastern Correctional Center through Washington University's Prison Education Program. Apollo has edited and read poems and prose for Copper Canyon Press, BOA Editions, Foglifter, The Spectacle, and others.
Writing
Selected
publications
Poetry, criticism, and fiction!
"Rotting Pigs and Fresh Snow: trans childhood and naming in Averno"
American Poetry Review
"Pastoral"
Prairie Schooner
"Princess Twelve," "my old man," "Mute Swan"
Colorado Review
"Lowly"
Shenandoah
"Like"
Meridian
"Shell Game"
Phoebe Journal
"some helpful printmaking tips"
ANMLY
"Sweetie Apple"
Ninth Letter
"Bloodwork"
The Arkansas International
"Tryst"
Poets.org
"Men"
Salt Hill Journal
"Signs" and "Downer"
Shō Poetry Journal
"Wunderkammer"
Foglifter
"Surrogate"
The Michigan Quarterly Review
"Unwish" · "Bird in Space…" · "After archival research…" · "Self Portrait / Romaine Brooks / 1923" · "Mama" · "Clothes"
Ploughshares · Indiana Review · Black Warrior Review · the minnesota review · Cherry Tree · Washington Square Review
Beyond the page
Other cool stuff
Because of Her Story Fellowship
Smithsonian Institution National Portrait Gallery
Conducted archival research on interwar period trans and gender-non-conforming expats in France. Designed and led public programming workshops and wrote articles in support of the “Brilliant Exiles: American Women in Paris from 1900-1939” exhibition. Intertwined archival work on HIV/AIDS care in Washington D.C. and installation pieces to design public programming for the “Félix González-Torres: Always to Return” exhibition. Wrote ekphrastic poems from the portraits encountered.
Tin House Summer Workshop
McCormack Writing Center
Selected for the Tin House Summer Workshop, supported by the McCormack Writing Center.
Free Expression Leadership Fellow
PEN America
Constructed a poetic oral history of trans activism through conversations and poems. Researched book banning trends, drafted press releases and briefing papers, and developed programs connecting PEN's resources with grassroots advocacy groups across America.
Schwartz Discover Grant Fellowship
University of Rochester
Meshed archival research from San Francisco to Chicago with poetics to create a poem cycle about trans lives and survival in the 19th century, intertwined with intimate moments with trans kin today.
Patchwork Interdisciplinary Fellowship
Counterclock Lit Mag
Created a six-minute film poem in collaboration with filmmaker Amy Richards and composer Zoe Wynns.
Editorial work
BOA Editions — Intern, 2023
Copper Canyon Press — Intern, 2022
Open Letter Books — Intern, 2021–22
No Contact — Poetry Reader, 2022
Black Lawrence Press — Intern, 2021–22
Readings &
performances
Poetry x Rage
Poetry at the Point Reading
Watch recording →
Get in touch
Let's connect
For readings, publications, collaborations, and correspondence.