And hello. Happy 2026. My name is Meridian Johnson. I am a writer who practices community medicine, and a holistic health practitioner who practices loving being human in a human body. In the creative realm, I work primarily in the genres of poetry, creative/literary nonfiction and film, but I also write long form fiction, hybrid work, and self-help/spiritual guides for what I call the Human Embodiment Movement, which has been a major thread-through of my life's work. On this website you can find updated information about my written work, publication and performance news, current projects, as well as links to my professional holistic health clinic and community-based workshops and intensives offered in 2026-2027. Thank you for being here.

10 Week Community Writing Room

Here is an abbreviated list of journals that have published my poetry in recent years: Volt, Poetry Daily, AGNI Online, Water~Stone Review, The Laurel Review, North American Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Gettysburg Review, BPJ, and Massachusetts Review. New Rivers Press published my debut full-length poetry collection Kinesthesia in 2010 and some of my nonfiction work can be found at NPR's On Being website and elsewhere.

"Places to Pray and Play In" and "Where the Earth Is Most Torn" at National Public Radio's On Being. A commercial script, voice over, and collaboration with Ron Hamad - Larkspur House. A long poem "Not Within Walls" can be found at ucity review. The Shape of Things" from AGNI Online, published under the name Stephanie N. Johnson. Wilderness online journal published an early Alaska essay here "Where the Road Ends."

Oftentimes I work on several projects at the same time. I would like to say I focus completely on one thing until the product is complete, but my rhythm in inspiration has always provided several rewarding ideas simultaneously. That said, the longer I live the more FOCUS leads me onto one track at a time. I welcome this. Right now, I'm fielding a television screenwriting project, a novel based upon a story of a Japanese boy adopted by an American doctor, two poetry collections titled Industries of Creation and Not Within Walls. I am also completing a long term nonfiction project, a treatise and manual about human embodiment that relates to my professional work in the world. As I mentioned above, I have two podcasts debuting later this year - my main focus at the moment. Long time coming on this now popular and high visibility media format. 

I am committed to honoring the brilliant designs in Nature that teach us about the aliveness of our connection with all of Life. We are gifted with communication and improvisation so that we can express diplomacy and humility in our mutual belonging to one another. In my writing, I question the sociocultural structures that diminish our ability to flourish in our interdependency. Despite the claim that AI threatens to displace (or replace) human usefulness and ingenuity, I hold a space in my mind, as a daily thoughtfulness, for the potential of a large-scale humanitarian shift in consciousness toward the united field of the Heart. This shift cannot be mimicked or manufactured. It doesn't mean "sameness"  for humanity, or lack of diversity of experience. It means accountability for our freedom to CHOOSE how we show up in our lives. This doesn't mean perfection. It means humble return again and again to our inherent responsibility to our interconnectedness. 

Having a background in middle school and secondary education did not lead to me working in a traditional school environment. After teaching English as an instructor at the University of Minnesota I went on to teach English as a Second Language at Hmong American Partnership in St. Paul, Minnesota. From there I taught professional and personal leadership development practices to groups and individuals from different parts of the world. I've taught meditation, bodywork, creative writing, kinesiology, somatic wellness practices, and other eclectic course offerings in unique community settings. I love to teach and mentor and I hold this role as a sacred partnership in the spectrum of relationships we can experience as human beings. In 2026 I am offering a 10 ongoing community writer's workshop, a 20 week community intelligence course called Principles of Engagement and later in 2026-27 a year-long immersion experience called The Great Dreamer. 

I was born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and attended a public grade school where immigrants arriving in the United States in the 1980s and 1990s were welcomed in a supportive, community-oriented environment. Growing up in daily relationship with classmates whose languages, family histories, and worldviews extended far beyond my own shaped my social imagination early on. I remain deeply grateful for the multicultural perspectives that formed the living tapestry of my childhood.

Hot air balloons were another defining backdrop of my formative years. Both of my parents were hot air balloon pilots and self-employed in lighter-than-air aviation for much of my childhood. Their niche professional life quietly trained my perceptual senses: to see the world from above in all seasons, to witness a pilot’s embodied trust in intuition, and to learn weather patterns as living relationships rather than abstractions. These experiences had a lasting influence on my artistic imagination and later professional path working with the living physiology of the human body.

I earned a BA in English and Education from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and an MFA in Creative Writing (poetry) with a graduate minor in Complementary and Alternative Therapies (nutrition emphasis) from the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities. I have also received degrees and certifications from the Scherer Institute of Natural Healing, the HeartMath Institute, the Wholistic Kinesiology Institute, UCLA’s Professional Program in Screenwriting, and the Academy of Wholistic Manual Medicine. I recognize that my educational experiences reflect a form of access not available to everyone, and they continue to inform how I understand responsibility, care, and the ethics of my work, which is deeply the work of being-of-service to others. I have had the greatest teachers imaginable who have taught me to claim every lived encounter as an opportunity to learn and grow. 

For more information about my professional and clinical holistic health work, please visit www.biopoetics.com