Ozone Park Journal 
A new journal from the MFA Program in Creative Writing
& Literary Translation at Queens College, CUNY.
A Journal from the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Queens College, CUNY


Contributors


SPRING 2010 CONTRIBUTORS

Sara Bohannon, a native of Richmond, VA, recently received her MFA in poetry from Virginia Commonwealth University.  She has previously been an assistant gallery editor for Blackbird: an online journal of literature and the arts, and currently self-publishes a zine called The Edge of the Pod.  

Stacie Boschma is a writer and performance poet living in Decatur, Georgia. Her poetry has appeared in a number of publications, and her live show has occurred on a variety of stages across North America. Her website is www.unicornpettingzoo.com.

Adina Dabija is a poet and playwright from Aiud, Romania. Her first book, poezia-papusa "Barbie Poem,” was awarded the Bucharest Writers Association Guild Prize. Her second book, Stare nediferentiata "Undifferentiated State,” was distinguished with the Tomis Award. She lives in New York, where she practices Oriental Medicine. Claudia Serea translated “The Blood” in the issue of Ozone Park.

Daniel W. Davis is a graduate student born and raised in Central Illinois.  His work has appeared in various online and print journals. You can follow his work and musings at here.

Alan Elyshevitz is a poet and short story writer from East Norriton, PA. His poems have appeared most recently in Two-Bit Magazine, Sleet Magazine, and San Pedro River Review. In addition, he has published two poetry chapbooks: The Splinter in Passion’s Paw (New Spirit) and Theory of Everything (Pudding House). Currently he teaches writing at the Community College of Philadelphia.

Rachel Fogarty-Oleson is a student at the University of South Florida, where she is pursuing her BA in creative writing.  Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming, in numerous journals and magazines including thread, Bridle Path Press, and Mobius: A Literary Magazine.   She is also the 2010 recipient of the Thomas E. Sanders Scholarship in Creative Writing award.

Gagan Gill is a translator and poet born in Delhi, India. She has published four collections of poetry and two volume of prose: Ek din lautegi larki (One day the girl will return); Andhere me Buddha (Buddhas in the dark);Yah akanksha samay nahin (Inopportune desire); and Thapak thapak dil thapak thapak, Gill has been a visiting writer at Iowa International Writing Program in 1990 and a Nieman Fellow for Journalism at Harvard University in 1992-93. She currently lives in New Delhi.

Eugene Guillevic (known as simply Guillevic)--1907-1997. Author of over fifty books of poetry, essays, translations and children’s stories, he is one of the most highly regarded French poets of the 20th century. While writing primarily in French (what he considered the language of the enemy), he is considered part of the Breton Movement and one of its most esteemed patriots. In its original French, Guillevic’s poems are rich in rhythm and cadence while at the same time can be extremely subtle of image. In his poems he sees profoundly austere Breton landscapes and lives, not as incidental backgrounds, but as elemental, living presences. His poems embody his indignation at the use and misuse of some human beings by others--as well as his cold and clear understanding of historical process. Guillevic has been translated into English by Denise Levertov and Teo Savory. Thomas Rain Crowe translated “The Art of Poetry” in this issue of Ozone Park.

Michael Lee Johnson has published seven poetry collections including Running in Place; At Park and East Division; and The Lindbergh Half-century, all from L’Epervier Press; The Inheritance, Sandhills Press; and Storm Service, Basfal Books. His honors included nomination for the James B. Baker Award in poetry. He is also a contributor to the Silver Boomers Poetry Anthology about aging baby boomers. His work has been published in USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Scotland, Turkey, Fuji, Nigeria, Algeria, Africa, India, United Kingdom, Republic of Sierra Leone, Thailand, Kuala Lumpur, and Malaysia. He lives in Itasca, Illinois.

William Kennedy is a poet from Phoenix, AZ.  He currently lives in Atlanta, GA.

T. Koelb has a Master's in creative writing from the University of East Anglia (UK). His first ms., the novella Fate’s Lieutenant, was shortlisted for the Faulkner Society’s William Faulkner/William Wisdom prize. His fiction has appeared most recently in The Madison Review, and his reviews of books and art appear regularly in a number of publications, including The Guardian and The Times Literary Supplement.

David Kutz-Marks holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia University and a BA in English Language and Literature from The University of Chicago. Past work appears in The University of Edinburgh Journal.

Diana Manister is New York City poet who has performed at such venues as the late lamented punk rock club CBGB's, St. Mark's Church Poetry Project, The Living Theater, Bowery Poetry Club, the Lyric Recovery Festival at Carnegie Hall, as well as at colleges and universities. A Contributing Editor of Big City Lit, she is also an elected member of the American Branch of the International Critics Association (AICA). Her poetry reviews appear regularly in The Modern Review and online at BigCityLit, about.com, small press exchange and artezine. Her poems have been published and exhibited in print and web publications and anthologies including PoetryRevolt, Autumn Sky, Salonika, Big Bridge, Waterworks, The Cleave, snarke.com among others.

Bruce McRae is a Canadian musician, his first book The So-Called Sonnets is forthcoming through Silenced Press of Ohio. His website is www.bpmcrae.com

Christopher Munde is a poet born in Ozone Park, NY. He received his MFA from the University of Houston in 2008, and celebrated first by loading up on Italian horror movies and books, and then by getting married, since two incomes are essential to effectively collecting horror movies. Munde has been awarded an Academy of American Poets Prize, and was a finalist for the Hudson Book Prize.  My work has most recently appeared in Hunger Mountain and Pebble Lake Review.

Claudia Serea is a Romanian-born poet who immigrated to the U.S. in 1995. Her poems and translations have appeared in Mudfish, Main Street Rag, Oberon, The Comstock Review, Harpur Palate, Exquisite Corpse, Fourth River, The Red Wheelbarrow, and in numerous other anthologies and journals. She is the author of two poetry collections: Eternity’s Orthography (Finishing Line Press, 2007) and To Part Is to Die a Little, selected as a contest finalist by Main Street Rag in 2009. She also writes creative nonfiction, published by The Rambler and The Writers’ Workshop Review.

Adrian Stumpp currently scribbles in South Ogden, Utah, where he resides in a subterranean apartment with his long-suffering wife, Britta.  His work has appeared or is forthcoming in journals such as Metaphor, Aisthesis, BlazeVOX, and The Emprise Review.  His collection of short-stories All the Variables & Other Love Stories won first place in the 2009 Utah Arts Council's book-length manuscript competition.

Gregory F. Tague, Ph.D. (Professor of English at St. Francis College, NY) has published creative non-fiction writing (two nominated for a Pushcart Prize), on subjects such as pain, memory, responsibility, creativity, adoption, and nature in journals (recently, for example), such as: Blue Print Review; Subtle Tea; Willows Wept Review; Dark Sky Magazine; Cezanne’s Carrot; The Midwest Quarterly.

Shrikant Verma (1931-86) was a poet from a small town in Madhya Pradesh, Central India, had a career in both journalism and politics. He was General Secretary of the then ruling Congress Party and rose further to become the speech writer for the late Indian Prime Minister Mrs Indira Gandhi. While he wielded considerable clout in power circles, his poetry was haunted by self- doubt and paradox. His work appears in many genres including poetry, short story, essays, and intimate journals. Verma was awarded almost all the major literary awards in India during his short lifetime. Magadh, his book of poems named after the fabled ancient Indian city, remains one of the groundbreaking works in contemporary Hindi poetry. It used familiar historical and mythic places with immense resonance in the Indian psyche to express his deeply ironic take on the contemporary political and social scene. Arlene Zide and Gagan Gill translated “Hearsay” for this issue of Ozone Park.

Changming Yuan grew up in rural China, authored several books before moving to Canada, and currently teaches writing in Vancouver. Yuan's poems have appeared in Barrow Street, Best Canadian Poetry, Drunken Boat, Exquisite Corpse, London Magazine and more than 200 other literary publications worldwide. With his debut collection (Chansons of a Chinaman) and monograph (Politics and Poetics) both released in 2009, Yuan has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

Arlene Zide is a translator and editor working on an anthology of Chicago area women poets,Chicago Fire, with Carolyn Rodgers. Her work has been published in numerous journals and anthologies in the US, Canada and in India including, Meridians, Rattapallax,Evening Street Review, 13th Moon, Colorado Review, California Quarterly, A Room of Her Own, and among others. Her translations of Hindi poets have appeared in publications such as Exquisite Corpse, The Bitter Oleander, Salt Hill, and Rhino. Print publications include the Everyman Series: Indian Love Poems, Oxford Anthology of Indian Poets, Chicago Review, Modern Poetry in Translation (UK), International Poetry Review, Malahat Review, Blue Unicorn, Chase Park and in Language for a New Century (Norton Anthology).

James K. Zimmerman is not only a poet, but a clinical psychologist in private practice, after having been a songwriter and performer in a past life.  He is the winner of the 2009 Daniel Varoujan Award and both the 2009 and 2010 Hart Crane Memorial Poetry Awards.  His poems appear or are forthcoming in The Hawai'ian ReviewThe Cafe ReviewIconSlab, and Penumbra, among others.


FALL 2009 CONTRIBUTORS


Gary Beck
is author of chapbooks including Remembrance and The Conquest of Somalia. He also has a collection of poetry, Days of Destruction. Beck’s original plays and translations of Moliere, Aristophanes and Sophocles have been produced Off Broadway and in colleges and outdoor venues. His poems and short stories have appeared in numerous print and online journals. He lives in New York City, where he's busy writing.

Janelle Brin’s work has appeared in several literary magazines, including Cypress Dome, Glossolalia, Jewish Spectator, Phoenix, Poetica Magazine, The Florida Review, The Southeast Review and The Tipton Poetry Journal.

Tobi Cogswell is a recipient of the first annual Lois and Marine Robert Warden Poetry Award from Bellowing Ark Press.  Her work has been published in numerous journals and magazines, most recently in Spoon River Poetry Review, KNOCK Journal, TranscurrentSugar House Review,Illya’s Honey and Ginosko. She has three chapbooks and her book Poste Restante is forthcoming from Bellowing Ark Press.  You can find her at the San Pedro River Review www.sprreview.com where she is an editor.

Wende Crow
lives in Tennessee. Her work can be seen in Ploughshares and LIT.

Catherine Curan
is a journalist and fiction writer. Her work can be found in the New York Post, Crain's New York Business, Newsday, WWD, Worth, among others. Her honors include the 2004 Newswomen's Club of New York's Front Page Award. Her creative writing has been published in Fiction, Many Mountains Moving, the SalonZine, Sleet Magazine and The Reader (forthcoming). She is the Associate Publisher of Anderbo.com and a volunteer mentor with Girls Write Now. Curan lives in New York.

György Faludy (1910-2006) Hungarian poet and aesthete was born and died in Budapest but spent much of his long life in exile, first during WWII for being Jewish and a socialist, and later for his unwillingness to support the Communist regime. For someone who enjoyed nothing more than the peace of a library he had a very adventurous life; in his first exile he traveled though France to North Africa and from there to the US where he enlisted and served until the end of the war, mostly in the Pacific theater. Back in Hungary after the war he was arrested as a spy. The revolution in 1956 opened the way for his second exile to England and Canada until 1989, his triumphant return home. By the late 1930's he had enough momentum and popular acclaim to sustain him as a poet even in exile.

Jenna Giannasio is a talented writer of work that revolves around queer landscapes and remembrance. After many years working in New York City's music industry & nightlife, where she DJ'd drum and bass nights (as DJ101), did radio shows, and wrote lyrics, she turned to academia. Currently Giannasio is finishing her degree in Gender Studies and English Literature at Hunter College.

KJ Hannah Greenberg's work has recently appeared in Poetry Super Highway, The Mother Magazine, The New Absurdist, The New Vilna Review, and The Shine Journal. Greenberg is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Humanities grant. She has given up all manner of academic hoopla to chase a hibernaculum of imaginary hedgehogs and raise children.

Christine Hamm
is the author of the poetry collection The Transparent Dinner; she has also written four chapbooks, Children Having Trouble with Meat; The Animal Husband; The Salt Daughter; and Dampen.
Hamm’s writing has been featured in numerous literary journals and has also been anthologized in Homewrecker: An Adultery Reader; and The Murdering of Our Years: Artists and Activists on Making Ends Meet. Her honors include being named runner-up as Queens Poet Laureate, two nominations for the Pushcart Prize, and a "Best of the Web" award. She is a PhD candidate in English Literature at Drew University, and teaches English at York College. 

Roger W. Hecht is author to two poetry collections including Lunch at the Table of Opposites, a poetry chapbook; and The Erie Canal Reader.  His poems have appeared most recently in Elimae, Mudlark, and Diagram.  Hecht lives in Ithaca, NY and teaches creative writing and literature at SUNY, Oneonta.

Paul Hostovsky's poems have won a Pushcart Prize, the Muriel Craft Bailey Award from The Comstock Review, and chapbook contests from Grayson Books, Riverstone Press, and the Frank Cat Press. He has been featured on Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, The Writer's Almanac, and Best of the Net. His newest collection of poems, Dear Truth, is forthcoming from Main Street Rag. Visit his website at: www.paulhostovsky.com

Henry Israeli is the author of New Messiahs; the editor and co-translator of Fresco: Selected Poetry of Luljeta Lleshanku; and Child of Nature. In 2001, he received a grant for poetry translation from the National Endowment for the Arts. He serves as the published for Saturnalia Books and teaches in the English and Honors Departments at Drexel University.

Luljeta Lleshanaku is an Albanian poet born in Elbasan, Albania in 1968. She was educated in literature at the University of Tirana and was editor in chief of the weekly magazine Zeri i rinise (The Voice of Youth). She then worked for the literary newspaper Drita. Lleshanaku is the author of four collections of poetry, Fresco, is the only collection that has been translated into English. She is the recipient of the 2009 Vilenice Kristal prize for world poetry, and is the winner of the best book of the year award from the Eurorilindja Publishing House.

M (Constance Hall) has appeared in a number of journals including Pedestal, Babelfruit, Word Riot, Prick of the Spindle, The Dirty Napkin, The Rose & Thorn, and Juked. She has been the Associate Poetry Editor for the online magazine, Stirring: A Literary Collection since 1999. She also serves as an Administrator of on online poetry workshop called Wild Poetry Forum, and as Co-Chair of the Portland Unit of the Oregon State Poetry Association. In addition, she has recently taken on the post of Managing Editor for VoiceCatcher, a non-profit collective that produces an annual anthology of Portland area women’s poems and prose. 

Peter Magliocco
is author of the novel The Burgher of Virtual Eden; and transeXotica, which was nominated for a Pushcart prize. He writes from Las Vegas, Nevada, and his poetry has appeared in small press and online publications including The Smoking Poet; A Hudson View Poetry Digest; The Beat; Opium Poetry and Heeltap.

Matthew McGevna received his MFA in Creative Writing from Southampton College in 2002, where he was awarded the John Steinbeck Prize for Best Graduate Writing. His most recent publications are forthcoming in Karamu and Confrontation Magazine. His piece included in Ozone Park is part of a collection based on his experience growing up on Mastic Beach, Long Island. He currently lives in Jackson Heights where he's working on his first novel.

Matt Morello
is a teacher and writer. He enjoys writing about strange people from Long Island and New York City. He has recently published an article about former President Bush in Clamor Magazine and an article about the Amityville horror house in Hitch Magazine. Other work has been published in Pindeldyboyz and American Feed Magazine


Peter E. Murphy
is the author of Stubborn Child, a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize; and Thorough & Efficient. He is the recipient of a Poetry Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. Murphy currently teaches at the Richard Stockton College where he directs the Winter Poetry & Prose Getaway in Cape May as well as other programs for poets, writers and teachers.


Alison Roh Park is a writer, performer and activist from Queens, New York. She is a Kundiman fellow and former artist-in-residence of the Asian Arts Initiative, where she performed her solo show, A Magpie Sang on the 7-Train. Her work has appeared in The NuyorAsian Anthology, Asian Pacific American Journal and Yellow Medicine Review and she has performed and educated across the U.S. Alison is an MFA student at New York University.

Roger Singer has had over 300 poems published multi-nationally in small presses and online sources including Pens on Fire; Northern Star; Black Book Press; Underground Voices; Subtle Tea; Ocean and Big Muddy. He lives in Glenville, New York where he has kept a private practice as a chiropractor for 33 years.

Lynne Shaprio‘s work has appeared in various literary magazines in the United States and England, including Myslexia, Trespass, Hiss Quarterly, Qarrtsiluni, Switchback, and Umbrella. Her poetry has been anthologized in Eating Her Wedding Dress: A Collection of Clothing Poems; and Decomposition: An Anthology of Fungi Poetry. She lives in New Jersey, where she teaches at Hudson County Community College.

Paul Sohar
is the author of eight collections of translation including Dancing Embers. He has also published his own work including the poetry collection, Homing Poems; a prose book, True Tales of a Fictitious Spy; and two children's books. He has numerous magazine credits including work in Aurorean, Chelsea, Chiron, Grain, Kenyon Review, Poem, Seneca Review, and Rattle.

J. Tarwood has published in magazines ranging from American Poetry Review to Visions and has published two books, The Cats in Zanzibar, and Grand Detour. His poem, "Ben Franklin Needed Bifocals To Speak French," was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2003.  He has lived most of his adult life in East Africa, South America, and the Middle East.


SPRING 2009 CONTRIBUTORS


Wesley Biddy is currently a Ph.D. student in Religious Studies at Marquette University. His poems have appeared most recently in The Comstock Review, Fickle Muses, The New Pantagruel, Lunarosity, and Communiqué.

J. Bradley is a poet based out of Orlando, FL. Previous work has appeared in decomP, Word Riot, November 3rd Club, Gloom Cupboard, and Prick of the Spindle and will appear in upcoming issues of Poetry Midwest and The Monongahela Review.

Annie Cardi will receive her MFA at Emerson College in May 2009. Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Vestal Review, The Georgetown Review, Juked, TBR Tallboy, The Shine Journal, and 21 Stars Review. She is currently at work on a novel.

Maryelizabeth Christine lives in Louisville, KY with her daughter Lydia and her husband Oz. She teaches writing part-time at Spalding University and Jefferson Community and Technical College. In May 2009, Finishing Line Press released her first chapbook entitled Skinny Dipping. Skinny Dipping was featured as a finalist in the 2008 New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition. She was also featured in Kentucky Monthly as one of Kentucky’s next generation of writers in November 2008.

William Doreski
has work which has appeared in various e and print journals and in several collections, most recently Another Ice Age (AA Books, 2007).

Drew
has been in love many times and has danced on many dance floors. She is one of the original Clueless Collective members and has even appeared in print on a few occasions. When not scribbling poetry she can be found at: www.cluelesscollective.co.uk.

Carmen Firan, a poet and fiction writer, has published twenty books of poetry, novels, essays and short stories in her native Romania. Since 2000, Firan has lived in New York, first as part of Romania’s cultural diplomatic service. Her writings have appeared in translation in numerous literary magazines and anthologies in France, Israel, Sweden, Germany, Ireland, Poland, Canada, the U.K., as well as the U.S. Recent books and publications here include The Second Life (short stories—Columbia University Press, 2005), The Farce (novel—Spuyten Duyvil, 2003), In The Most Beautiful Life (poems with photographs—Umbrage Editions, New York, 2002), and three other books of poetry published in New York, Afternoon With An Angel, The First Moment After Death, and Accomplished Error. The poem included here is from Firan’s new collection, Rock and Dew, to be published by Sheep Meadow Press later in 2009. Poems from this book have been published in Talisman, Asheville Poetry Review, The Light Millennium, Notre Dame Review, Poetry Miscellany, The Broome Review, Barrow Street and (forthcoming) Osiris.

Howie Good, a journalism professor at the State University of New York at New Paltz, is the author of six poetry chapbooks, most recently Tomorrowland (2008) from Achilles Chapbooks. He has been nominated three times for a Pushcart Prize and twice for the Best of the Net anthology.

Donald Illich has published work in LIT, Passages North, Nimrod, The South Carolina Review, and several
other journals. He was awarded Honorable Mention for the Washington Book Prize, and he was a semifinalist for the Discovery Prize. He lives in Rockville, Maryland.

Michael Lee Johnson
lives in the Itasca, Illinois area, after spending 10 years in Edmonton, Alberta Canada during the Viet Nam era. He is a freelance writer and poet, heavily influenced by Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, Irving Layton, and Leonard Cohen. To date he has over 348 poems published in over 280 journals and online publications. He has been published in the United States, Canada, Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Nigeria, India, and the United Kingdom.  He is the author of the poetry paperback book The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom. His website can be found at: http://poetryman.mysite.com/.

Laura LeHew is an award winning poet whose poems have appeared or are forthcoming in such journals as Alehouse Press, Battered Suitcase, Her Mark Calendar ’07 & ’09, HeartLodge, Pank, PMS, and Untamed In. The chapbook Beauty is due out in May ’09 from Altered Crow Press. She received her MFA in writing from the California College of The Arts, a writing residency from Soapstone, interned for CALYX Journal, and has just been nominated for a Pushcart. In her spare time she is busy spinning up a new press: Uttered Chaos www.utteredchaos.org.

Francine Rubin
is a graduate student at Columbia University, working towards becoming a certified high school English teacher. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College and a BA in Theater from Dartmouth College. Her poetry has been published in Fringe Magazine and the Long Island Pulse. She has also previously worked as a ballet teacher.

Tom Sheehan’s most recent books are Brief Cases, Short Spans, and From the Quickening. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Ocean Magazine, Perigee, Rope and Wire Magazine, Qarrtsiluni, Green Silk Journal, Halfway down the Stairs, Ad Hoc Monadnock, Hawk & Whippoorwill, Eden Waters Press, Milspeak Memo, Ensorcelled, Canopic Jar, SFWP, Eskimo Pie, Lyrical Ballads, Lock Raven Review, Indite Circle, Northville Review, Pine Tree Mysteries, and in forthcoming anthologies including Home of the Brave, Stories in Uniform, and Milspeak Anthology. He has received ten Pushcart Prize nominations, a Noted Story of 2007 nomination, the Georges Simenon Award, and will appear in the Dzanc Best of the Web Anthology for 2009.

Adam J. Sorkin
, regional editor for Romania/Moldova of New European Poets (Graywolf). He recently published Memory Glyphs, a collection of three Romanian prose poets, Cristian Popescu, Iustin Panta and Radu Andriescu (Twisted Spoon, 2009) and Ruxandra Cesereanu’s Crusader-Woman, translated with Cesereanu (Black Widow, 2008). His awards include the Corneliu M. Popescu Prize for Poetry Translation of The Poetry Society (U.K.), International Quarterly Crossing Boundaries Award, and Kenneth Rexroth Memorial Translation Prize, as well as NEA, Rockefeller Foundation, Academy of American Poets, Arts Council of England, Fulbright, Soros, and Witter Bynner Foundation support for translation activities. Sorkin is Distinguished Professor of English, Penn State Brandywine.

Lena Sze is a graduate of Brooklyn College's MFA Program. Her work has appeared in A/P/A Journal, The Brooklyn Review, and Skidrow Penthouse, and the volume The NuyorAsian Anthology: Asian American Writings About New York City. Poetry awards include the John Russell Hayes Poetry Prize at Swarthmore College and First Place in the 2005 CUNY Arts Gala Poetry Contest.

J. A. Tyler
is the author of the forthcoming novella Someone, Somewhere (ghost road press) and the chapbooks The Girl In The Black Sweater (Trainwreck Press) and Everyone In This Is Either Dying Or Will Die Or Is Thinking Of Death (Achilles Chapbook Series). He is also founding editor of mud luscious / ml press and was recently nominated for a Pushcart. Find more info here: www.aboutjatyler.blogspot.com.

Bonnie Yarry grew up in Jackson Heights and is a graduate of the competition: City College with a BA in history. She writes for trade publications, freelances for the Orlando Sentinel newspaper, and is thrilled that several literary magazines have accepted her work recently. Her career began at age nine as an artist’s model and she’s had jobs ranging from funeral home secretary, tour guide, and flight attendant, to editor of a federal newspaper, tutor, teacher, and graphologist. She’s in her 50th year of writing in her diary every day. Her novel is based upon those journal entries and she is seeking a publisher. Her bag is always packed for the next adventure.

Barbara Zaragoza lives in Naples, Italy where she roams the ancient Greek and Roman ruins when she's not writing. She holds a Master's degree in Russian and East European Studies from Stanford University and is currently writing a novel set in 1946 Eastern Europe. You can find her at www.barbarazaragozaauthor.com.


FALL 2008 CONTRIBUTORS

Oscar Bermeo was born in Ecuador and raised in the Bronx. He now makes his home in Oakland, where he is the poetry editor for Tea Party magazine and lives with his wife, poet Barbara Jane Reyes.

Donna Brook
, author of four books of poetry, has recently had poems in The Brooklyn Rail, The Recluse and Hanging Loose #93.

Robert Calero graduated from Queens College with a BA in English. He is currently employed as perhaps Manhattan's tiniest bouncer at a jazz bar in the West Village.

Christie Casher is a teacher and writer from Brooklyn, NY. She has been published in Fair Use and the Pipe Dream and edited an anthology of poetry, Ugly Poets, Beautiful Poems (Lagoon Drive Press, 2004). She received her MFA from Emerson College in 2006 and an MS in Education from Pace in 2008. She is currently working on a new book and teaching English Language Arts in East New York.

Cyrus Cassells is the author of four acclaimed books of poetry: The Mud Actor, Soul Make a Path through Shouting, Beautiful Signor, More Than Peace and Cypresses. Among his honors are  a Lannan Literary Award. He is a Professor of English at Texas State University-San Marcos.

Eric Darton
’s novel Free City (WW Norton 1996) was subsequently published in German and Spanish translations. His cultural history of the World Trade Center, Divided We Stand (Basic Books, 1999) became a New York Times bestseller. He is currently writing and publishing, via weekly email installments, an ongoing journal of our strange times called Born Witness. His most recent book is Beaky Chronicles, twelve animal tales for adults, with illustrations by Katie Kehrig. Other of Darton's writings may be found at www.ericdarton.net.

Mary Christine Delea is the author of The Skeleton Holding Up the Sky (Main Street Press, NC), two chapbooks, and over 200 published poems. Upcoming publications include Eclipse and Cider Press Review. Originally from Long Island, she now lives in Oregon with her husband and their five cats.

Deborah Di Bari grew up in East Harlem. After graduation from FIT, she pursued a career in textile and fashion design. She plans to continue nourishing her passion for narrative and writing in an MFA program after completion of the Goddard College BFA in Creative Writing, where she is a founding editor of Guideword.

Judy Gerbin is a graduate of Pratt University and works as a graphic designer. She is currently writing short stories and poetry. She lives in Yonkers with her husband.

Robert Hershon has published 12 poetry collections, most recently Calls from the Outside World.  He is co-editor of Hanging Loose Press and executive director of The Print Center. He has won two NEA Fellowships and three from New York State.

Ry Kincaid’s poems appear in recent or upcoming issues of Tipton Poetry Journal, The Honey Land Review, Poetry Flyer, and The Battered Suitcase. His historical baseball play, The Rajah of Saint Louis, debuted last year. Kincaid lives in Kansas City, Missouri.

Cathy McArthur’s poetry has appeared in Jacket, Lumina, The Melic Review, Xconnect. Shampoo, The Memphis State Review, Blue Fifth Review, sonaweb, and other presses. Her work was selected for
CUNYArtsGala, 2004, 2005 and 2006. In 2006 she received an MFA in Poetry from The City College of New York, and was also awarded The Malanche Prize for her translations of Contemporary Latin American Poets. She currently teaches Literature and English Composition at CCNY. She is also Program Coordinator for the Readings On the Bowery series, sponsored by Four Way Books.

Lynne Martens is a New Yorker who now lives in Vermont to be near her family. She owns her own business, a Pilates exercise studio. She loves flash impressions of startling beauty--an inspiration for the poem "A Potted Plant In June." 

Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich lives and writes in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Michael Morical’s work has appeared in various journals including The New York Quarterly, Rattapallax, Frogpond and The Pedestal Magazine.  His first chapbook, Sharing Solitaire, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.

Mihaela Moscaliuc’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Beloit, New Letters, Connecticut Review, Meridians, Crab Orchard Review, and Poetry International. She has published reviews, translations, and articles in Arts & Letters, Mississippi Review, Mid-American Review, Prairie Schooner, The Georgia Review, Soundings, and elsewhere.

Rena J. Mosteirin
is a poet and fiction writer. She is the winner of the 2008 Kore Press Fiction Chapbook award for her story "Nick Trail's Thumb." She blogs poetry at White Whale Crossing. Rena has also won the Sydney Cox Memorial Award (2005, 2007), the Grimes Prize (2007), and the Class of 1954 Award (2007). She is a graduate of Dartmouth College and currently lives in Thetford, VT.

Susan O'Doherty is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal Press, 2007). Her work has appeared in Eureka Literary Magazine, Northwest Review, Ballyhoo Stories, Apalachee Review, Eclectica, and Literary Mama, and the anthologies Sex for America: Politically Inspired Erotica (HarperPerennial, 2008), Mama, Ph.D: Women Write About Motherhood and Academic Life (Rutgers University Press, 2008), About What Was Lost: Twenty Writers on Miscarriage, Healing, and Hope (Penguin, 2007), and It’s a Boy! (Seal Press, 2005). New work is scheduled to appear in Ars Medica,and Feed Me! Writers Dish about Food, Eating, Weight, and Body Image (Random House, 2009).  Her popular advice column for writers, "The Doctor Is In," appears each Friday on the publishing blog Buzz, Balls & Hype.

Lisa Romeo, a New Jersey resident, writes essays and other nonfiction for a broad range of media, including The New York Times, magazines, literary journals, and anthologies. She is at work on a memoir and recently completed an MFA in nonfiction.

Thaddeus Rutkowski is the author of the novels Tetched and Roughhouse. Both books were finalists for an Asian American Literary Award. He teaches fiction writing at the Writer's Voice of the West Side YMCA and lives with his wife and daughter in Manhattan.

Diane Shakar
is a Reiki Master and instructor. She is currently writing short stories and poetry. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband.