Birds flock around us everyday. Find how three authors were influenced by the birds around them to create worlds, interpret life, or just find what they have to teach us when we pay attention.
Location: HSBC Hall, UBC Robson Square
Moderator: Leanne Boschman
Readers: Cecily Nicholson, Crowd Source (Talonbooks) | Elaine Ávila, Hummingbird (Talonbooks) | Melissa Hafting, Dare to Bird: Exploring the Joy and Healing Power of Birds (Rocky Mountain Books)
About The Moderator
Leanne Boschman
Leanne Boschman has loved the music and mystery of poetry her entire life. Besides publications in journals and anthologies, Leanne has two collections of poetry: Precipitous Signs: A Rain Journal (Leaf Press, 2009) and Here at the Crux (Silver Bow Publishing, 2022), as well as a forthcoming chapbook entitled Household Dangers (JackPine Press, 2025)
About The Readers
Cecily Nicholson
Cecily Nicholson is the author of five books, including From the Poplars, recipient of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize, and Wayside Sang, winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for poetry. Her collaborative practice spans museum, artist-run centre, and community-based arts organizing and education. She is an assistant professor at the School of Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia and the 2025 Holloway Lecturer in the Practice of Poetry at the University of California, Berkeley.
Elaine Ávila
Elaine Ávila’s plays are produced in Central America, Europe, the US, Canada, and Australia. She is cofounder of the International Climate Change Theatre Action, now involving 75,000 participants worldwide. Some of her Best New Play Awards include: Jane Austen, Action Figure (Festival de los Cocos, Panamá City), Lieutenant Nun (Victoria Critics Circle), and Café a Brasileira (Disquiet International Literary Program in Lisbon). Elaine has taught in universities from Portugal to Tasmania, China to Panamá. She has served as the playwright in residence at Pomona College in Los Angeles, Quest University Canada, and Western Washington University; as the Endowed Chair and Head of the MFA Program in Dramatic Writing at the University of New Mexico; and founder of the LEAP Playwriting Program at the Arts Club Theater in Vancouver. The 2019 Fulbright Scholar to the University of the Azores, Elaine lives in New Westminster with her musician-teacher husband and her artist-activist son and is on the Creative Writing Faculty at Douglas College.
Melissa Hafting
Melissa Hafting is an ecologist, bird guide, author, and photographer. She founded the BC Young Birders Program in 2014, which aims to bring together youth of all races, sexual orientations, and genders to look at birds on fun excursions in the natural world. The program also helps teach youth about citizen science and the importance of birdconservation. She is also passionate about making birding more inclusive for all, especially for BIPOC birders like herself. She is an avid traveller and loves to explore the world looking for birds. Melissa is an eBird reviewer for the province of BC and sits on the board of directors of the Frontiers in Ornithology Association and Wild Bird Trust of BC. She was also a judge for the 2022 and 2023 Audubon Photography Awards, the recipient of BC Nature’s 2021 Daphne Solecki Award for contributing to nature education for children in British Columbia, a finalist for the 2021 Nature Inspiration Awards for the Canadian Museum of Nature, a lead in the 2020 CBC TV documentary, Rare Bird Alert, winner of the 2024 Alan Duncan Bird Conservation Award, and in 2025, Melissa was awarded the King Charles III Coronation Medal. Her photography can be viewed on her Instagram account @bcbirdergirl (+11,000 followers). Melissa lives in Richmond, British Columbia.
