SpokenHeard with Ryler Dustin and Susan Dobbe Chase

Ryler Dustin grew up in Bellingham, Washington, where he met the friends who introduced him to poetry and continue to inspire him. A finalist of both the Ruth Lilly Prize and the Individual World Poetry Slam, his work bridges the gaps between people to celebrate the common strangeness of being human. It examines the bizarre elegance of our biology, the awkwardness of love, and the awe inspired by our increasingly wide view of the universe.

Ryler recently graduated from the University of Houston's MFA program, where he was awarded the prestigious Verlain Poetry Prize. He teaches poetry to middle school students with the Houston nonprofits Writers in the Schools and Project Row Houses.