Michelle Li

lover of joan didion, monet, and audrey hepburn.

• Select Publications
• Awards & Honors
• Experiences
• About & Contact
• Linkedin

Selected Works

• You Shouldn't Have All of This

• Portfolio for Scholastic

• 3 Poems & 1 Fiction Piece in Eunoia Review

• No, but I once got very close—

• Finale: Love Letters to My Great Aunt in The Penn Review

• 2014, reframed in dishsoap quarterly

• Good Kids in Vagabond City Lit

• Golden Shovel for Eileen Wu in Up the Staircase Quarterly

• Devotions in Frontier Poetry (forthcoming)

• Fair Weather in Aster Lit

• 3 poems in Up North Lit

• Elegy—in BRAWL

• 2 Poems & 1 Prose Piece in Temz Review

• In another life, I'm sure... in Sontag Magazine

• Lullabies for Extinct Things in The Inflectionist Review

• Of Love in Frazzled Lit

• Texas in Summer, Let's Have an Hour Underneath the 8pm Sky in Chantarelle's Notebook

• Wither on the Vine & Aloe Vera in Aster Lit

• In Rhode Island in Sophon Lit

• The world has not been kind, Blue Marble reprint, in Mister Magazine

• Wither on the Vine in wildscape. literary journal

• Notes From a Sane, Self-Proclaimed Writer in Fleeting Daze

• I should have left for Walden Pond, Concord in Luxury Literary

• It Took A While in The Incandescent Review

• Where the sky has cracked itself open on a winter morning and two children are cold and bleeding in Tension Literary

• lily, lily in The Incandescent Review

• On Mornings in Lumina Journal

• Because I am in a room I don't belong in Blue Marble Review

• Elegy, Because I am Sorry in Stone of Madness Press

• I Try Searching For You in Definitions in Gastropoda Literary

• Where I take a walk into the night that approaches in The Incandescent Review

• Big, Big World in Idle Ink

• Ribs in Masque and Spectacle

• Ribs in Paper Crane Journal, reprint

Awards and Honors

Best of the Net Nominations, Dishsoap Quarterly, 2027
Adroit Prizes for Poetry & Prose, Commended, 2026
Brooklyn Poets Festival Fellowship Finalist, 2026
Cipher Poetry Prize Shortlist, 2026
Gold Key (x8) w/Portfolio Nomination, Silver Key (x6), Honorable Mention (x18) – Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards, 2023–2026
National Gold Medal – National Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards, 2026
National Silver Medal (x4) – National Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards, 2024, 2025
National Portfolio Honorable Mention – National Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards, 2026
Narrative High School Writing Contest, First Place, 2026
Bennington Young Writers’ Awards, Creative Non-fiction, First Place, 2025
National High School Poetry Contest, JUST POETRY! National Winner (x2) & Topical Winner, 2025
The Waltham Forest Poetry Competition, Commended, 2023
Young Writer's Journal Winner, 2024
Austin Youth Poet Laureate Finalist (x2), 2024, 2025
Apprentice Writer, Runner Up in Outstanding Fiction, 2024
Sophon Lit, Shortlist, Annual Contest, 2024
Starlit Award, Honorable Mention, Aster Lit, 2025
Rising Voices Awards 2024 Fiction Finalist
Best of the Net Nominations, Sundress Publications, 2025
Best New Poets Nomination, 2026
Sundress Publications Poetry Broadside Contest, 2025, Semifinalist
The Poetry Society of New York's Youth Poetry Contest, Finalist, 2026
DePaul’s Blue Book: Best American High School Writing 2026 (x2), Winner & Finalist

Experiences

Tutoring
2 time PVSA Gold MedalistEditing
Sontag Magazine, Poetry Reader
Dishsoap Quarterly, Micro-Fiction Reader
Iron Horse Literary Review, Associate Editor
The Incandescent Review, Editor, Editor in Chief (2023-2026)
Pen and Quill Magazine, senior editor (2022-2026)
The Dawn Review, editor
Hominum Journal, Editor in Chief
Ex-Puritan, Reader
Okay Donkey, Poetry Reader
Palette Poetry, Reader
word UP! Writers, Mentorship Director
Outreach Intern, SUNHOUSE Mentorship
Executive Team, Young Poets WorkshopsPrograms
92Y Unterberg Poetry Center Alumnus
Kenyon Review Summer Young Writer's Program, Student of Jamie Lyn Smith
International Women's Writing Guild Rhode Island Conference
Incandescent Review Summer Mentorship Program, Teaching Assistant
Adroit Summer Mentorship, Mentee of Zainab A. Omaki

About and Contact

李奕轩/Michelle Li has been nationally recognized by Scholastic Art and Writing, Bennington Young Writers Awards, Narrative Magazine, Adroit Journal, and Brooklyn Poets. An alumna of the Kenyon Review Young Writers Workshop and the Adroit Summer Mentorship, her work is forthcoming or published in Up the Staircase Quarterly, The Penn Review, and Frontier Poetry. She is the author of Late Birds (kith books, 2027), and edits for Okay Donkey, Palette Poetry, Iron Horse Literary Review, and The Ex-Puritan Review. In addition, she plays violin and piano, loves Rachmaninoff, blackberries, Sally from LINE, and the rain.Contact:
[email protected]
Instagram: @kitkat.7731
Substack: https://limichelle.substack.com/
Goodreads: kitkat7
(reach out for any reason! come and say hi!)