Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer is a poet and installation artist in St. Louis. She is the author of the poetry collections Well Waiting Room (Fordham University Press, Editor’s Prize, 2021), and Cleavemark (BOAAT Press, 2016), as well as the children’s book The Cloud Lasso (Penny Candy Books, 2019). Her poems, art, and criticism have appeared in or are forthcoming from numerous journals, including Bomb, Bennington Review, Georgia Review, Harvard Review, Iowa Review, AGNI, Washington Square, At Length, The Offing, LIT, The Wilson Quarterly, Colorado Review, Ploughshares, and the Poetry Foundation. She is the recipient of a 2022 artist support grant from the Regional Arts Commission and an Artistic Innovations Grant from Mid-America Arts Alliance for a collaborative installation with Cheryl Wassenaar. Among other honors, Schlaifer was the runner-up for the 2019 Iowa Review Prize, and in 2016, she served as the Greyfriar Writer-in-Residence + Living Literature Series at Siena College. She frequently collaborates with other artists on works that combine language and visual art. Contact her to schedule a class visit, reading, or other engagement.

With over 20 years of professional copywriting and editing experience, Stephanie is available for freelance writing, editing, marketing, and creative projects. She provides a variety creative services to businesses, organizations, and individuals across diverse industries, including retail, commercial real estate, higher education, and art & design. Projects include digital marketing and communications, creative concepts and strategy, promotional brochures, video scripts, email marketing, advertising, grant writing, product catalogs, essays + reviews, and product development. See Stephanie’s copywriting + editing portfolio>>

Order a copy of Well Waiting Room, Cleavemark, or The Cloud Lasso

Praise for Well Waiting Room

“These are poems of fierce wit, intense grief, and immense linguistic beauty, that pose—in tones alternately harrowing, savage, heartbreaking, and droll—the most urgent philosophical, moral, and spiritual questions of our time.” —Lee Ann Roripaugh, author of tsunami vs. the fukushima 50

“I’m in awe of these razor-sharp poems and the acuity with which they capture our desires and sorrows, our desperate measures and attempts at careful measuring.”—Jessica Baran, author of Equivalents