4.01.2008

April 2008 Contributors


About the Artist for this issue: 
Star by Anne Marie Marra
Anne Marie Marra , this issue’s featured artist, is also a poet, and multimedia creative force who lives in the wilds of Putnam County, NY. She completed an M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies from Vermont College with a focus on creativity. Her writing and photographs have been published in Womankind: The Poetry of Women, Volume III; Empire State College’s Many Waters Literary Magazine & The Tatler Newsletter. She is a frequent host at the Hudson Valley Writers’ Center third Friday Open Mike in Sleepy Hollow. She wowed the crowd as an alternate on the first ever Westchester County Slam Team 2007, and at Poetry Slam, Inc., SUNY Oneonta Poetry Camp where she was selected as one of the Spotlight Poets. State: New York In this issue: Her quilt-art is featured on every page.

About the Writers and Poets: 
Rebecca Balcárcel's work has appeared in over 30 journals and magazines, including North American Review, Mothering Magazine, 5AM, Concho River Review, Clockwatch Review, South Dakota Review, and others. She took her MFA from Bennington Writing Seminars in 2002 and received their Jane Kenyon Poetry Prize. Rebecca teaches creative writing at Tarrant County College. and University of Texas at Arlington. She is Associate Professor of English at Tarrant County College. She lives in Texas with her three sons, aged 13, 10, and 10. (yes, identical twins) She writes at sandboxes, swingsets, or at her desk in the middle of the night! State: Texas In this issue: Daughter of Salt 

Gary Beck is a theater director of both the classics, and new plays. His translations of Molière, Aristophanes and Sophocles, as well as his own plays, have been extensively produced off-Broadway. A number of his one-act plays have recently been published in Elimae, Istanbul Literature Review, Gold Dust Magazine, Clever Magazine and the 2nd Hand. His poetry and fiction have been widely published in venues including Enigma, Dogwood Journal, EWG Presents, Nuvein Magazine, Babel, Vincent Brothers Review, L'Intrigue Magazine, The Journal, Short Stories Bimonthly, Bibliophilos and many others. His poetry chapbook 'The Conquest of Somalia' will be published by Cervena Barva Press. State: New York In this issue: I like Eyck

Kim Bridgford is a professor of English at Fairfield University and editor of Dogwood and Mezzo Cammin. Her books include Undone, nominated for the Pulitzer Prize; Instead of Maps, nominated for the Poets’ Prize; and In the Extreme: Sonnets about World Records, winner of the Donald Justice Prize. She is currently working on a three-book poetry/photography project with visual artist Jo Yarrington, focusing on journey and sacred space in Iceland, Venezuela, and Bhutan. She is the Connecticut Touring Poet for 2007. State: Connecticut In this issue: Robert Frost in Iceland (As previously published in the Robert Frost Review.) Wendy Taylor Carlisle is an accidental Texan.  She has published one book, Reading Berryman to the Dog, Jacaranda Press, and one chapbook, After Happily Ever After, 2River Chapbook Series,#15, her new book, Discount Fireworks, will be coming from Jacaranda Press in March, 2008. Her work appears most recently in Salt River Review, http://www.poetserv.org/ and Ghoti magazine,  http://www.ghotimag.com. State: Texas In this issue: Go Directly To

Alan Davis, who grew up in New Orleans and now lives in Minnesota, has published two books of short fiction Alone with the Owl and Rumors from the Lost World. "Oxygen" is part of The Sock Monkey Song Book, an unpublished collection of sudden fictions. State: Minnesota In this issue: Oxygen

Richard Deming is a poet and a theorist who works on the philosophy of literature. His poems have appeared in such places as Sulfur, Field, Indiana Review, and Mandorla, as well as Great American Prose Poems: From Poe to the Present. He is the author of Let’s Not Call It Consequence (Shearsman), about which Susan Howe has written, “Deming restlessly calculates the split between promised and actual experience. The poems in his impressive new collection balance at an edge of danger syntax can only shadow.” With Nancy Kuhl, he edits Phylum Press (www.phylumpress.com). He is currently a lecturer at Yale University. State: Connecticut In this issue is Annus Mirabellis which was previously published as part of a chapbook (Led Astray by Language) and in Richard Deming’s new book, Let's Not Call It Consequence.

Margaret A. Frey writes from the foothills of the Smoky Mountains . Her work has appeared in print and on-line venues, including Notre Dame Magazine, Thema, Byline Magazine, flashquake, Kaleidowhirl, Skirt! Magazine, Christian Science Monitor and elsewhere. New work appears in the Trillium Literary Journal and the Birmingham Arts Journal. Margaret won Cezanne’s Carrot’s “Return to Light” contest [flash fiction category] in December 2007. A past finalist in the Erma Bombeck writing competition, she was also a Writers' Digest Chronicle winner in 2003. Margaret lives with her husband John and her canine literary critic, Ruffian. She can be reached at: mafrey@tds.net State: Tennessee In this issue: So Many Doors

John Grey is an Australian born poet, playwright, musician. Latest book: “What Else Is There” from Main Street Rag. Recently in: The English Journal, The Pedestal, Pearl and the Journal Of The American Medical Association. State: Rhode Island. State: Rhode Island In This issue: Reasons Why Love Never Dies | Early man camping with Gale



Doris Henderson’s work has appeared in the Connecticut River Review, Black River Review, Slant, Comstock Review, Parting Gifts, Common Ground, New Verse News, Bent Pin Quarterly.net, and other journals. Also in Caduceus, a publication of the Yale Medical Group, and Heartbeat of New England, an anthology of New England nature poets. State: Connecticut In this issue: Mona’s Wedding 

Donald Illich is a technical writer with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Rockville, Maryland. He has had poetry published in The Iowa Review and Fourteen Hills, New Zoo Poetry Review, Roanoke Review, HazMat Review, Passages North, Nimrod, Cold Mountain Review, and other publications. His Web site is www.floatnotswim.com. State: Maryland In this issue: Not On Time

Radomir Vojtech Luza has had over 100 poems published in literary journals such as Papyrus, Poet, New Laurel Review, Nerve Cowboy, Eintouist, Sahara, Spare Change and Writers of The Desert Sage. He has Featured and read in poetry readings all over the country.Radomir has also organized and hosted many succesful poetry series in NYC, LA and NJ. He is also the Editor and Publisher of Voices In The Library and CALIFORNIA EAST. He is CEO of Radman Productions whose Dancing Sprite Publications publishes accomplished as well as emerging voices. Radomir would like to thank the city of his title for inspiration and perspiration. The marriage of art and commerce not withstanding. State: California In this issue: BYE L.A.

Melissa McEwen lives in Bloomfield, CT, with her son "Izzy the Jock." And even though she works full-time (from home for a small company in Colchester, CT) and is busy going to football and baseball practices and games, she finds time to read and write. Poetry will never be put on the back burner. She also likes going to the poetry readings at the Wintonbury Branch Library in Bloomfield and she says: "Hi, Marilyn!" State: Connecticut In this issue: The Boys who could

Mark McGuire-Schwartz - Thought he claims that bears raised him, this bearded poet is out of hibernation and into retirement where he runs the Wednesday Nigth Poetry Series (http://wedpoetry.net) in Bethel , CT and is a host for the Word of Mouth poetry series in New Haven. His work has appeared in RogueScholar.com, The Fairfield Review, Caduceus, Long River Run, 55 words, and the Whatever Literary Journal. His play Meeting Arthur Miller was produced as part of the Short and NEAT program during the 2004 International Festival of Arts and Ideas, in New Haven. State: Connecticut “Is them things called stars?”

Eugenie Rounds Rayner wrote her first poem at six years old has been writing essentially all her life. . Originally self-published, her first novel, Song of the Blessing Trees has been picked up by Gilead Books in the UK and will be re-published in 2008. A sequel is in the works, as well as two poetry chapbooks and other writing and art projects. One of the chapbooks, Anatomy of a Psalm, is forthcoming from Jaded Silence Press. More information is available on her Website, which is still in transition, at www.LadyBirchCreations.com. State: Vermont In this issue: The “Life List” 


Mg Roberts was born in Subic Bay, Philippines. Currently, she teaches in the San Francisco Bay area. She is an MFA graduate of New College of California, where strange tricks were added to her bag. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Five Fingers Review, How2, Wordriot, horse less review, and 13:after. If she weren’t a poet she would be a snake handler, ormaybe just a good speller. State: California In this issue: Missives of Appropriation and Error i-iV

Robin E. Sampson’s poetry has appeared in Bent Pin Quarterly, New Verse News, Wicked Alice, The Bitter Oleander, a chapbook We Shijin; Book 1 and other assorted places. She has an essay included in the book Poem, Revised: 54 Poems, Revisions, Discussions (Marion Street Press, April 2008). She is one of the hosts of the Bethel, CT Wednesday Night Poetry Series and a member of the performance troupe Shijin. State, Connecticut. In the issue: Loom

Wayne Scheer, after teaching writing and literature in college for twenty-five years, retired to follow his own advice and write. He's been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a Best of the Net. His work has appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, Notre Dame Magazine, The Pedestal, Eclectica, Triplopia, flashquake, and Flash Me Magazine. Wayne lives in Atlanta with his wife and can be contacted at wvscheer@aol.com. State: Georgia In this issue: The Adventures of Bluey Swanson

Pete Simonelli is a 37-year-old resident of San Francisco where he has worked and lived for the last seventeen years. For the last five years, he’s performed as the vocalist in a band named Enablers. Many of his poems have been arranged and recorded as "spoken word" pieces with the Enablers. Past publications of certain poems include Poetry Motel and Marrow magazines. State: California In this issue: "Mediterranean" which has been recorded as a spoken word piece by the Enablers.

Wendy Vardaman of Madison, WI, has a Ph.D. in English from University of Pennsylvania. Her poems, reviews, and interviews have appeared or are forthcoming in a variety of anthologies and journals, including Riffing on Strings, Letters to the World, Poet Lore, Poemeleon, qaartsiluni, Main Street Rag, Nerve Cowboy, damselfly, Free Verse, Wisconsin People & Ideas, Women’s Review of Books and Portland Review. When not writing, she home schools two of her three children and volunteers for small but enormously valuable arts’ organizations, like the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, and The Young Shakespeare Players (Madison). State: Wisconsin In this issue: The Scottish Play

Dasha Walters -- A poet, competitive kick-boxer, Licensed Practical Nurse, former optical specialist who sees clearly life’s maladies. She is a member of the writer’s group Sub-Q and the poetry performance troupe Shijin, and here work appears in We Shijin I from Hanover Press. State: New York In this issue: Hackbarth’s 28th Semi Annual Bridal Extravaganza

Dan Wilcox has been a central figure in the Albany, NY, poetry scene for decades. He is a widely-published poet, who has pleased crowds from coast to coast with his insightful, political, and highly-charged poetry. As a photographer he has amassed the world’s largest collection of photographs of unknown poets. State: Connecticut In this issue: The Night Sky

Carol Clark Williams is the present poet laureate of York , PA. She is a rostered artist with the York Cultural Alliance Arts in Education program, and teaches poetry workshops for high school students, senior citizen centers, support groups, and residents of institutions. Her poems have been published in print and online journals including Margie, Byline, Mad Poets Review, Encore, the Pedestal, and Fledgling Rag. State: Pennsylvania In this issue: Reverse Magic

Martin Willitts Jr. is a senior librarian in New York, and has current poems in Big City Lit, Slow Trains, Hiss Quarterly, Cherry Blossom Review, Pulse, Fawlt, and others, as well as a print chapbook "Lowering Nets of Light" (Pudding House Publications, 2007), an online chapbook "News From the Front" (www.slowtrains.com 2007). He was editor of "Alternatives to Surrender" (Plain View Press, 2007), , an anthology of poems about cancer . State: New York In this issue: Momentary | Black Snake River which is part of a longer poem about the Black River area which covers four states.

About the Editor: 
MM Walker is a former staff reporter and columnist , who holds a bachelors degree from Charter Oak State College and 30 graduate credits in writing, art and other odd subjects from Wesleyan University and from Western Connecticut State University where she tutored in the writing lab. Her past poetry has appeared in The Underwood Review, The Fairfield Review, The Common Ground Review, Poeticas, X-Magazine, The Natural Networker, The Sacopee Valley News, on the In Our Own Words website etc. She has a chapbook Inverse Origami, the art of Unfolding, is a member of the Shijin poetry performance troupe, and webmistress for the Wednesday Night Poetry Series. 4/1/08