Ken Hada is a poet and professor at East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma where he directs the annual Scissortail Creative Writing Festival. Ken finds the natural order a powerful presence for writing. His work has received the 2022 Oklahoma Book Award, the 2017 SCMLA Poetry Prize, has been featured on The Writer’s Almanac, received the Western Heritage Award, named finalist for the Spur Award and six-time finalist for the Oklahoma Book Awards. In 2017 Ken gratefully accepted the Glenda Carlile Distinguished Service Award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book. His published poetry collections include: Come Before Winter, Feral Skies: Selected Poems 2008-2020, Contour Feathers, Sunlight & Cedar,  Not Quite Pilgrims, Bring an Extry Mule, Persimmon Sunday, Spare Parts, Margaritas & Redfish, The Way of the Wind and The River White: A Confluence of Brush & Quill. The “Ken Hada Collection” is held at the Western History Collection Library at the University of Oklahoma. Ken enjoys reading his work at venues around the country.