Sheila Squilllante

Sheila Squillante is a writer and visual artist living in Pittsburgh. She is the author of the poetry collections, “Mostly Human”, winner of the 2020 Wicked Woman Book Prize from Brick House Books, and Beautiful Nerve. She’s also authored four chapbooks of poetry: “Dear Sunder, In This Dream of My Father”, “Women Who Pawn Their Jewelry” and “A Woman Traces the Shoreline”. Her debut essay collection, “All Things Edible, Random and Odd: Essays on Grief, Love and Food”, was published by CLASH Books in 2023, and “The Brightest Days: New and Selected Poems” will be published by Braddock Avenue Books. Her abstract paintings have been featured in numerous literary journals, including ”Brevity and A-Minor”, and as the cover art for “Dogwood: A Journal of Poetry and Prose”. She directs and teaches in the MFA program in creative writing at Chatham University, where she is executive editor of “The Fourth River“, a journal of nature and place-based writing. For more than a decade, she was the facilitator of the Summer Community of Writers, a ten-day residency that brought together nationally renowned writers, MFA students and community members for intensive study at Eden Hall,  Chatham’s organic farm campus. She lives in the Hazelwood neighborhood of Pittsburgh, with her family.