Bio Notes
		Jesse Goldstein lives in Brooklyn. He currently loves his bicycle, the farmer's market, roasted vegetables, Rockaway Beach, and Lynn Yaeger's red-bob haircut and painted cheeks, to name a few. His work has appeared in Open City, The Village Voice, City Limits, and The New York Sun. Stanley Jenkin's stories and essays have appeared in Eclectica, Amelia, 32 Pages, Blue Moon Review, CrossConnect, the Oyster Boy Review, and many others. He lives in Queens, New York. Halvard Johnson, who lives in New York City, is author (with James Cervantes) of a new collection of poems: Changing the Subject -- out soon from Red Hen Press. Jalina Mhyana is a massage therapist living in northern Japan. She has been published in A Room of One's Own, nycBigCityLit, Moxie Magazine, and Japanophile Journal. Jalina's work was chosen to represent Canada's 2003 International Shadow Project, a day of remembrance for Japanese victims and survivors of the 1945 atomic bombings. She is editor of Rock Salt Plum Poetry Review Margo August Woods lives in the Bronx. When she's not writing, she's squishing cockroaches with her bare feet. Yannis Ritsos - "...the stars quietly sawing through that raised bronze arm." (May 16, 1968) - Plagued for years by the same strain of tuberculosis that killed his mother and elder brother, unable to finish law school, and disturbed by his father's mental illness, Yannis Ritsos (1909-1990) became a writer and a communist, not necessarily in that order. He wrote enough poetry to fill a hundred books, and this popularity with readers, critics and translators was matched only by his unpopularity with the right-wing governments that came into power in post-war Greece. One of his books was symbolically torched with other banished works at the foot of the Acropolis, and for several years of house arrest on a remote Grek island he was forced to write poetry on scraps of paper small enough to fit into bottles, which then had to be buried to ensure survival. Resilient, resourceful and prolific, like his Chilean peer, Neruda, Ritsos wrote many political poems and outlived several tin-pot dictators. Of more lasting value, perhaps, to those of us who shared the vagaries of the 20th Century with Ritsos, is his deeply resonant exploration of exile and persecution, of the assault on the integrity of the self. In earlier days, Jeff Schiff studied with Anthony Piccione, William Heyen, and Raymond Carver. He took his Ph.D. in English (Poetry, Poetics, and American Literature) at SUNY Binghamton in 1983. Since, he has taught writing, literature, and oral communications at McNeese State University, Purdue University, and Northern Arizona University. His poetry and prose have appeared in about 60 periodicals, including: The Ohio Review, Poet & Critic, The Louisville Review, Chicago Review, Hawaii Review, and The Southwest Review. He lives with his wife and son in Evanston, Illinois. Jeff Schiff is currently Professor of English at Columbia College—Chicago. Rachel Schwartz was born and raised in Newton, MA. She attends Eugene Lang College, a division of New School University, as a writing major and formerly attended the university of Southern California for screenwriting. Ms. Schwartz lives in the East Village and, when not working, is currently focused on finding New York City's best cupcake. She'd like to thank her family for blessing her with unlimited material as well as their support. Laurel Snyder is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, an editor-at-large for the Land Grant College Review, and also a friendly person. Her poems have appeared (or are forthcoming) in Post Road, American Letters and Commentary, and Gulf Coast. She's currently working on a novel for kids and is obsessed with her website, jewishyirishy.com! Joe Somoza lives in Las Cruces with wife Jill, a painter. He recently did two readings in Arizona, at the Mesa Literary Festival and for The Poet's Voice in Bisbee.