Margarita Cruz received her MFA in Creative Writing from Northern Arizona University. She is a contributor for the Arizona Daily Sun and is a part time educator. Her works have been supported by Tin House Writer’s Workshop, Torrey House Press’ Voices for the West workshop, Kenyon Review Writer’s Workshop, Lighthouse Writers Workshop and Macondo Writers Workshop. Nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2022, and a semi-finalist for the Philip Levine Prize for Poetry in 2026, her work can be found in Rattle, Ploughshares, and the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-A-Day among other spaces. In 2021, she published her first chapbook, Amerixana, with Ignite Press out of Chatham University’s MFA program.