River Coello

River Coello is a Guayaquil-born cultural weaver based in Orlando. They are proudly Andean, kariwarmi, kuir, and disabled.

River is currently working on a new multimedia and multilingual project exploring complementary dualism through an Andean lens, titled YANANTIN, with support from South Arts. Their previous project, HAMPI, explored their early reconnection to the Andean cosmovision. The book (For the Birds Trapped in Airports, 2024-2026) received a Florida Book Award, an International Latino Book Award, an Independent Publisher Book Award, and a Nautilus Book Award. Reimagined as an immersive experience, HAMPI is currently being exhibited in Seattle at Jack Straw Cultural Center. It will be exhibited in Orlando at the LGBT+ Center thanks to United Arts of Central Florida. River's previous chapbook-length collections, faith/fe (2021) and self/ser (2019), were published by Homie House Press.

River was an Orlando Poet Laureate finalist and received an International WCS Award in media and creative influence. They have also received support from the Poetry Foundation, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Lambda Literary, the Canada Council for the Arts, among others. Their work is or will be featured in the anthologies We Still Can't Help It If We're from Florida (Burrow Press, 2027), Desde esta orilla (Digitus Indie Publishers, 2026), Emerge (Lambda Literary, 2025), eXpuestXs (El Beisman Press, 2024), and Sweeter Voices Still (Belt Publishing, 2021), as well as the University of Chicago Magazine, ICONIQA Mag/Book, and the Chicago Reader.