It’s early summer 2019, and Fresno State alumni author Marisol Baca is with her mom at the Fresno Yosemite International Airport, ready to catch a plane. She’s flying out to do a reading and book signing for her publisher, 3 Mile Harbor Press. 

Her debut poetry collection, “Tremor,” has recently celebrated its one-year anniversary, and Baca has just been named Fresno’s fourth poet laureate, the first woman to serve as the city’s top literary ambassador. 

At the boarding gate, Baca takes a call from a fellow alum asking if she’d be willing to volunteer for an unusual publishing project, to help raise money for a new student scholarship. Her charge: Write 15 new poems in 15 days, marathon style, as the university’s Creative Writing Alumni Chapter shares the poems in a month-long crowdfunding campaign.

Baca immediately says yes.

“I was so excited,” she said. “I thought it was such a creative, fun and thoughtful way to raise funds for scholarships, give support to Fresno State’s creative writing program and create a lot of interest and excitement.”

Baca is one of 15 Fresno writers — 13 Fresno State alumni, professor emeritus Juan Felipe Herrera and the city’s current poet laureate, Joseph Rios — who volunteered to join The Fresno 15 Creative Writing Marathon, a five-year drive to raise $25,000 for the university’s new Larry Levis Memorial Scholarship, which benefits graduate students in the Master of Fine Arts program.

From 2019-23, the marathon raised $26,238 from 159 donors, exceeding the crowdfunding project’s goal. Earnings from the endowed scholarship with the Fresno State Alumni Association will now provide an annual award to an MFA student in perpetuity.

Each October over the five-year campaign, three writers took their turns publishing 15 new pieces in 15 days, staggered throughout the month, as members of the Creative Writing Alumni Chapter promoted their work on the FresnoWriters.com project website. Community members “sponsored” the writers through donations big and small and encouraged them while they wrote. 

For Baca, who teaches English at Fresno City College, the writing marathon gave her motivation to create new work on a deadline while supporting her undergraduate alma mater.

“I was honored to have been asked,” she said, “and as soon as I was, I set about trying to think of which direction I would take with the new work.”

Baca first wrote eight poems about the surrealist painter Remedios Varo, whose paintings evoke wonder and curiosity. She then wrote seven poems with stories about her great grandmother and her sisters. Several of Baca’s 15-poem series have since been published in literary journals, and they form the backbone of her in-progress second collection of poems.

Baca said one poem from the project stood out, “The Gutiérrez Sisters in Grand Junction Boarding School, Colorado.” It was about her great aunt, Manuelita, and her two sisters. The poem later appeared as part of an interview in Ms. Magazine with the author Chivas Sandage.

“I had been researching my family history, and this was the perfect opportunity for me to work this family history into a poem,” she said.

Baca, who serves on Fresno State’s Arts and Humanities Advisory Board, said she loves the work that continues to flow from the creative writers in the English Department, and as an alumna she feels proud to champion MFA students through The Fresno 15.

“This project shows that the community loves and supports our writers,” she said. “The more people show interest in the arts, the more students will feel lifted up and supported as they create.”

The writers joining Baca, Herrerra and Rios as The Fresno 15 were: Sara Borjas, Michelle Brittan Rosado, David Campos, Sarah A. Chavez, Anthony Cody, Juan Luis Guzmán, Hermelinda Hernandez Monjaras, Lena Mubsutina, Monique Quintana, Steven Sanchez, Jeffrey Schultz and Brian Turner. 

Tapping in to a Community of Fresno Writers

Fellow Fresno author Ronald Dzerigian came up with the idea for the marathon, and he co-organized the project with the all-volunteer members of the Creative Writing Alumni Chapter. Dzerigian, a two-time Fresno State alumnus, works on campus as the coordinator of graduate student success and financial opportunities for the Division of Research and Graduate Studies.

In 2018, after publishing his debut poetry collection, “Rough Fire,” Dzerigian found himself looking for ways to jump-start his writing again. He participated in a poem-a-day marathon for Tupelo Press, writing new material daily for a full month straight. He saw the Tupelo 30/30 Project as an innovative way to earn money for the press while expanding its support network.

“We are surrounded by fantastic writers in the central San Joaquin Valley,” Dzerigian said. “So we thought, ‘why not tap into Fresno State alumni and Fresno writers of varying levels of success to raise funds for our new scholarship?’”

Dzerigian said his high school English teacher, Mike Cole, introduced him to the world of Fresno writers, and he has been in love with the voices of Central California ever since. Cole, also a Fresno State alumnus, taught the works of Philip Levine, Peter Everwine and C.G. Hanzlicek, the early faculty pillars of the university’s creative writing program. He also taught established writers such as Corrinne Clegg Hales, Dixie Salazar, C.W. Moulton, Sherley Anne Williams, Luis Omar Salinas and more.

These poets inspired Dzerigian, who first earned a bachelor’s degree in art at Fresno State, to return to campus to get his MFA in creative writing, and later to be part of the alumni chapter.

“My goal was to contribute to, and hopefully become part of, a new generation of Fresno writers,” Dzerigian said. “To bring together generations of notable and new writers that are associated with Fresno and Fresno State, in order to help raise funds for a scholarship named after an important Central Valley voice like Larry Levis — this made complete sense to me.”

Levis, an author of eight books of poetry, is among the most celebrated of Fresno’s creative writers. In 1968 he earned his bachelor’s degree in English from Fresno State, and he went on to a distinguished career as a writer and educator. In 1995 he was honored with the Outstanding Alumni Award from the College of Arts and Humanities. Levis passed away unexpectedly in 1996, at age 49.

Emily Muñoz, an annual giving analyst at Fresno State, said The Fresno 15 Creative Writing Marathon was a good fit for the university’s crowdfunding platform, which is used as a tool to give faculty, staff and students on campus a way to raise funds for causes connected with student success. Similar to websites like GoFundMe and Kickstarter, Fresno State crowdfunding hosts custom project pages that open up storytelling and fundraising opportunities to partners across campus.

“For some groups, like the Creative Writing Alumni Chapter, this is their first step into fundraising,” Muñoz said. “This can be a huge undertaking, so we do our part to provide a framework for success. Ultimately, we hope to teach project teams how to build a cycle of philanthropy in areas that don’t usually fundraise for themselves.”

The writing marathon aspect of the campaign built a unique sense of urgency for the supporters and inspiration for the writers, Muñoz said. And, because the campaign was envisioned as a five-year project, donors from previous years kept coming back and getting involved, knowing they’d be asked to support the project each October. 

“It was very inspiring to see the growth of the project year after year,” Muñoz said. “The writers and donors alike worked together to produce something of value that the next generation of writers can read and be inspired by.”

Finding a Writing Home at Fresno State

Taylor SealsThe campaign’s impact will live on at Fresno State through the now-endowed Larry Levis Memorial Scholarship. The 2024 recipient is Taylor Seals, a second-year graduate student studying poetry in the MFA program. Seals aspires to work in literary editing and publishing, and she said being named a Levis Scholar fills her with gratitude.

“I feel believed in,” Seals said. “Coming from a low-income household, all of my financial responsibilities fall on me, as I work to pave my way up. It lights a fire in me to think that someone believed in me enough to help me get further in my career. It means I made the right choice in calling Fresno State my writing home.

Seals said she grew up “always feeling like my voice was never loud enough.” One summer, she wanted to do something about it. She started binge watching poetry videos on YouTube, and she started highlighting random definitions in the family dictionary, a worn and thin-at-the-edges volume on her small family library shelf that was way older than she was.

Her love for writing quickly bloomed.

“For me, falling into poetry was like visiting a childhood home after forgotten years,” Seals said. “Like I knew exactly where to rest my head among the frayed familiarities.”

Her poetry focuses on human relationships, she said, as she explores how to forge and preserve the deep bonds in her life through generations of trauma and healing, the songs of her mother’s mother’s mothers, and her lesbian identity.

“I believe what’ll make me feel most accomplished as a writer and a professional is the hope that I can convince someone someday to pick up that pen and start writing,” Seals said. “There is so much more life wrapped up in voices the world still has yet to hear from.”

To continue Larry Levis’ legacy and support creative writing, visit the Fresno State Alumni Association giving form, and under giving opportunities select the “Larry Levis Memorial Scholarship,” or call 559.278.1569.

(Editor’s note: The author of this story, Jefferson Beavers, was the co-organizer of The Fresno 15 Creative Writing Marathon project with Ronald Dzerigian. He is a communication specialist in the English Department and a two-time Fresno State alumnus.)

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