~CONTRIBUTORS' NOTES~

WILLIAM AARNES has had two collections of poetry published, Learning to Dance and Predicaments.  His work also has appeared in a number of literary journals, including American Scholar, Field, Poetry, and Southern Review.  He teaches at Furman University.

JOHN BALABAN is the author of five collections of poetry (including After Our War, Blue Mountain, Words for My Daughter, Locusts at the Edge of Summer: New & Selected Poems, and Path, Crooked Path), three books of translations (most recently, Cao Dao Viet Nam: Vietnamese Folk Poetry), two nonfiction books, and two volumes of fiction.  His books of poetry have received various awards, including the Academy of American Poets' Lamont Prize, a National Poetry Series selection, and the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America. A past president of the American Translators Association, he is poet in residence and a professor of English at North Carolina State University.

SHEILA BLACK's poems have appeared in numerous journals, including Blackbird, Copper Nickel, DMQ Review, Ellipsis, Pedestal, Poet Lore, Puerto Del Sol, and Willow Springs.  In 2000 she was the U.S. co-winner of the Frost-Pellicer Frontera Prize, given to one U.S. and one Mexican poet living along the U.S.-Mexico border.  A chapbook, How To Be a Maquiladora, was released in January 2007 by Main Street Rag Press.  Her first full-length collection of poems, House of Bone, is published by Custom Words Press (2007).

CELIA BLAND is the author of thirteen books for young readers, including the historical novel, The Conspiracy of the Secret Nine, which was a finalist for the Heekin Award for Children's Fiction.  Her collection of poems, Soft Box, is published by CavanKerry Press (2004).  She also has had poetry in anthologies published by Persea and Faber & Faber.  Celia Bland is Director of College Writing at Bard College.

EVAN SCOTT BRYSON is a senior creative writing major at Valparaiso University and a winner of the university's Academy of American Poets award.  He also serves as editor of The Lighter, the student literary journal, where his interview of John Balaban first appeared.

T. ALAN BROUGHTON has published four novels, a collection of short stories, and six books of poetry.  A seventh collection of poems, A World Remembered, is forthcoming from Carnegie Mellon University Press.  He also has been the recipient of various grants, awards, and fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship.

MICHAEL CATHERWOOD's poetry has appeared in many magazines, including Agni, Black Warrior Review, Borderlands, Briar Cliff Review, Ecletica. Georgetown Review, Hawai'i Review, Kansas Quarterly, Laurel Review, Louisiana Literature, Mankato Poetry Review, Midwest Poetry Review, Midwest Quarterly, Nebraska Review, Pittsburgh Quarterly, Red River Review, South Dakota Review, and others.  His first book of poems, Dare, is published by Backwaters Press.

NICK CONRAD has had poetry published widely in literary journals, including Alaska Quarterly Review, Blueline, Crab Creek Review, Kansas Quarterly, The Literary Review, Mid-America Poetry Review, Pacific Review, Plainsongs, Potomac Review, Seattle Review, Southern Poetry Review, and Tar River Poetry. 

BARBARA CROOKER's Radiance won the 2005 Word Press First Book Award and was a finalist for the 2006 Paterson Poetry Prize.  Her second collection of poems, Line Dance, is forthcoming from Word Press.  Her poems have appeared in numerous literary journals, including Beloit Poetry Journal, Christian Century, Christian Science Monitor, Cream City Review, Denver Quarterly, Nimrod, and Smartish Pace.

MICHAEL DOBBERSTEIN teaches creative writing, desktop publishing, and literature at Purdue University-Calumet.  He has published poems in The Cumberland Review, The Formalist, The New Formalist, Poetry, and other journals.

JOHN DREXEL's poetry has been published in The Hudson Review, New Criterion, Paris Review, Salmagundi, and Verse, among other magazines.  The past recipient of an Amy Lowell Travelling Scholarship and a Hawthornden Fellowship, he is a regular contributor to Contemporary Poetry Review.

W.D. EHRHART is the author of more than twenty books or chapbooks of poetry and prose, including seven full-length collections of poems.  He also has edited anthologies of literature about the Vietnam and Korean wars.  In addition, his work has appeared widely in magazines and literary journals, such as American Poetry Review, Colorado Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, New Letters, North American Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, and War, Literature & Arts.

LAURA DAVIES FOLEY's poems have appeared in Atlanta Review, Georgetown Review, Newport Review, and elsewhere.  She is the author of two books of poetry: Mapping the Fourth Dimension (Harbor Mountain Press) and Syringa (Star Meadow Press).

JEFF FRIEDMAN's latest collection of poetry is Black Threads (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2007).  His previous books include Taking Down the Angel, Scattering the Ashes. and The Record-Breaking Heat Wave.  His work has recently appeared in Agni, North American Review, and Prairie Schooner.  He is a core faculty member in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at New England College.

ANDREW FRISARDI's poetry has appeared in Hudson Review, New Criterion, Southwest Review, and other magazines.  He has published a couple of books of poetry in translation, including Giuseppe Ungaretti: Selected Poems (Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2002).

KATE GALE's latest book of poetry is Mating Season from Tupelo Press.  She has published five collections of poetry, an autobiographical novel, and a bilingual children's book.  She also has edited three collections of short fiction and a collection of essays.  Her poetry has appeared in various literary journals, including Eclipse, Gargoyle, Hayden's Ferry Review, and Quarterly Review.  She is the managing editor of Red Hen Press and the editor of Los Angeles Review.  She teaches in the Graduate Humanities Program at Mt. St. Mary's.

H. PALMER HALL's stories, poems, and essays have appeared in various literary magazines, including Ascent, Briar Cliff Review, Florida Review, North American Review, Texas Review, and many others. He is the author of six books, including A Measured Response, From the Periphery: Poems and Essays, Deep Thicket & Still Waters, and Reflections on Publishing, Writing & Other Things. Most recently, Pudding House Press published his chapbook, To Wake Again. Another full-length collection of poems is forthcoming from Turning Point Books. He is the library director and teaches English at St. Mary's University in San Antonio, where he also edits Pecan Grove Press.

PENNY HARTER has published a number of books and chapbooks of poems, including Shadow Play: Night Haiku, Stages and Views, Grandmother's Milk, Turtle Blessing, Lizard Light: Poems from the Earth, Buried in the Sky, and Along River Road. Her new collection, The Night Marsh, will be published by WordTech Editions in January 2008. 

GREGG HERTZLIEB is the Director of the Brauer Museum of Art at Valparaiso University.  He has been awarded the Edward L. Ryerson Traveling Fellowship by the School of the Art Institute in Chicago and a Conant Writing Award for Poetry from Millikin University.  His artwork has been exhibited widely, including at the Aron Packer Gallery, August House Studio, the Central School of Art and Design in London, Columbia College, Elgin Community College, the Goodman Theater, and Struve Gallery.

RANDALL HORTON is a poet originally from Birmingham, AL, now living in Albany, NY. He was runner-up in the Main Street Rag Book Award contest and his manuscript, The Definition of Place (Main Street Rag, 2006) was published in their Editor's Select Series. He has an MFA from Chicago State University and was a 2006 Cave Canem Fellow. 

DIANE LOCKWARD is the author of What Feeds Us (Wind Publications, 2006), as well as two earlier collections of poetry, Eve's Red Dress and Against Perfection.  Her poems have been published in several anthologies, including Poetry Daily: 366 Poems from the World's Most Popular Poetry Website and Garrison Keillor's Good Poems for Hard Times.  Her poetry also has appeared in many journals, including Beloit Poetry Journal, Louisiana Literature, North American Review, Poet Lore, Prairie Schooner, and Spoon River Poetry Review.

CHRISTA MASTRANGELO's poetry has appeared in Arsenic Lobster, Blue Ridge Magazine, Florida English Journal, and Sunspinner.

JANET MCCANN is  a professor in the English Department at Texas A&M University.  Her books of poetry include Emily's Dress (Pecan Grove Press, 2005) and Looking for Buddha in the Barbed Wire Garden (Avisson Press, 1996).  She also has edited several anthologies of poetry.  Her poems have appeared in numerous magazines, including Kansas Quarterly, New York Quarterly, Nimrod, and Parnassus.

KAY MULLEN has authored two full-length collections of poetry, A Long Remembering: Return to Vietnam (2006) and Let Morning Begin (2001).  Her work has appeared in various literary journals and anthologies.

ANDRÉS RODRIGUEZ is the author of Night Song (Tia Chucha Press) and Book of the Heart: The Poetics, Letters, and Life of John Keats (Lindisfarne Press).  His poems and essays have appeared in The Alembic, Americas Review, Art & Academe, Blue Mesa Review, Quarry West, and other journals. 

BARRY SPACKS has had nine collections of poetry published, including The Hope of the Air (Michigan State University Press, 2004), Regarding Women (Cherry Grove Collections, 2004), and Spacks Street: New & Selected Poems (Johns Hopkins University, 1982).  A new book of poems, Food for the Journey, is forthcoming in 2008.  His poems also have appeared in a multitude of magazines and anthologies.

WILLIAM H. WANDLESS's poems have appeared in Brooklyn Review, Cincinnati Review, New Delta Review, Pearl, and other literary journals.  He is an assistant professor of English at Central Michigan University.    

LESLEY WHEELER's poems have appeared in a number of magazines, including Agni, American Poetry Review, Barrow Street, Blackbird, Crab Orchard Review, The Journal, Nimrod, Prairie Schooner, and Southeast Review.  Scholarship Girl, a chapbook, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press in 2008.  She teaches in the English Department at Washington and Lee University.

COVER PHOTO OF JOHN BALABAN: CAROLLA CLIFT