Author Biographies
Mark Allinson was born and raised in Melbourne, Australia (1947), where he has spent most of his life. Returning to study as an adult, Mark gained a teaching degree and a Ph.D from Monash University, where he taught English literature for some years. Since leaving Monash, Mark has been teaching literature to adults in his own Adult Education business. Mark now lives in Tomakin, South of Sydney, where he writes. lit4life@ozemail.com.au
Walter Bargen has published eleven books of poetry. The two most recent books are, The Body of Water (2003), Timberline Press, and The Feast (2004), BkMk Press-UMKC. His poems appear in recent issues of the Iowa Review, Boulevard, Beloit Poetry Journal, Notre Dame Review, and New Letters. He was the winner of the Chester H. Jones Foundation prize in 1997 and received a National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship in 1991. bargenw@missouri.edu Walter's Website.
Christopher Barnes has a booklet called Lovebites published by Chanticleer Press, 6/1 Jamacia Mews, Edinburgh cost £2.40
Steven Beatty grew up in L. A. and now lives with his family in Brooklyn. An antique furniture restorer by trade and amateur urban archaeologist by choice, Steven is an avid fan of light verse and lyrical poetry. Self-taught, he writes almost entirely in rhyme and off rhyme and continues to be influenced by his early encounters with A.A. Milne, Dr. Seuss, Ogden Nash and popular songs. These are his first publications. absl@earthlink.net
Born in Switzerland, Chantal Bruchez-Hall has been living in NYC since 1980. She is a clinical psychologist. (bruchezhal@aol.com)
Cullen Bailey Burns lives and works in Minneapolis. Her book Paper Boat was published in 2003 by New Rivers Press. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Luna, Many Mountains Moving, Poetry Northwest and many other magazines.
Jirí Cêch (http://home.earthlink.net/~jiricech) was born in Czechslovakia, where once Bohemia flourished. While a teenager, he fled Soviet occupation in 1968, along with thousand of other Czechoslovakians, and survived as a refugee in Switzerland by exchanging sex for food, beer and paper on which to write poetry. He arrived in the United States in 1971 where he is now a successful businessman, specializing in new construction and real estate development (i.e., suburban sprawl). His first book of poetry, Whither, won the Mennstrausse Poetry Award. Lately, his poetry has appeared in literary journals Pleiades and The Melic Review, and has been adapted to video, audio and hybrid hip hop that includes the hit, "What Would The World Be Without David Letterman on TV." His "art therapy" drawings have become an explosive sensation in the art world, receiving rave reviews (sans alliteration) at the 2004 Urban Culture Project art installation, "Alias." Jirí lives in New York City.
Jimmy Chen (jjameschen@hotmail.com) lives in Mississippi, where he works as a painter and writes occasionally. He has been published in Elevenbulls, Bullfight Review, Fourteen Hills, The Foliate Oak and Mcsweeney’s Internet. He will be included in upcoming issues of Snow Monkey.
Kevin Clark's book In the Evening of No Warning (New Issues Poetry and Prose, 2002) earned a publisher's grant from the Greenwall Fund. His poetry has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, including The Black Warrior Review, The Antioch Review, The Georgia Review, College English, etc. He's also published criticism about contemporary poetry in many venues, among them The Iowa Review, The Southern Review, and Contemporary Literary Criticism. His web site is:
http://cla.calpoly.edu/%7Ekclark/Wyn Cooper's book of postcard poems will be published by BOA Editions in 2005. Recent poems appear in Poetry, Crazyhorse, Agni, and The Journal. In 2003, Gaff Music released Forty Words for Fear, a cd of songs by Cooper and the novelist Madison Smartt Bell.
Cynie Cory's first book of poems is AMERICAN GIRL (New Issues, 1/1/04). CLINK STREET was runner up in the 2003 T.S. Eliot Poetry Prize. Her work has recently appeared in Shade, New American Writing and Verse. She lives in Tallahassee, Fl.
Mark Cox teaches in the Creative Writing Department at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington. His latest books are Natural Causes and Thirty-seven Years from the Stone, both published in the Pitt Poetry Series.
Susan Denning lives in Portland, Oregon, where she edits Caffeine Destiny (www.caffeinedestiny.com). Her poems have appeared in print in Seattle Review, Literal Latte and elsewhere, and are forthcoming online in In Posse Review.
Laurel K Dodge is a poet who lives in northeast Ohio.
Anne Gagel (agagel@yahoo.com) is a freelance artist and writer. Her work has shown in galleries around the Kansas City, MO area. She was co-editor of Chicken Scratches, a publication of student work at the Kansas City Art Institute. She is currently working on a series of artist books combining her writing with digital photography.
Mitchell Geller was born in Boston sometime between the end of WWII and the beginning of the Vietnam conflict. He has a BA in English literature, and an MA in children's literature. He is a professional makeup artist and has written all his life. PMMGBOB@aol.com
Matthew Guenette, graduate of the University of New Hampshire, received his M.F.A. at Southern Illinois University. A 2003 Pushcart Prize nominee, he was a semi-finalist—in 2002 at Tupelo Press, in 2003 at Steel Toe Press—for earlier versions of Lonesome Des Moines. Matt has worked as an English Instructor, data-entry clerk, salesclerk in a gallery, manual laborer, and a busboy. He lives in Bloomington, IL.
H. L. Hix’s first poetry books won the Peregrine Smith Award and the T. S. Eliot Prize. His recent books include a collection of essays on poetry entitled As Easy As Lying, a poetry collection, Surely As Birds Fly, and an anthology, Wild and Whirling Words. His next poetry collection, Shadows of Houses, will be published in 2005.
Ariana-Sophia Kartsonis' work has appeared or is forthcoming in: Florida Review, Indiana Review, Margie and Glimmer Train. She is currently at work on a book of essays in collaboration with Eliot Khalil Wilson.
Guy Kettelhack is the author or coauthor of more than 30 nonfiction books, including DANCING AROUND THE VOLCANO, EASING THE ACHE, HOW TO MAKE LOVE WHILE CONSCIOUS and THE WIT & WISDOM OF QUENTIN CRISP. His poem "What It’s Like to Have Sex With Me" appears in the online lit mag Outstretch; "Arriviste," in the January 2004 issue of Van Gogh’s Ear; "Vibrato" was selected as first honorable mention in the IBPC January 2004 competition; and "Alter Ego" was selected as a quarterfinalist poem in the 2004 Lyric Recovery competition. He has given readings at A Different Light and CBGBs in New York City. A violinist who has played in numerous chamber groups and orchestras in New York, and an artist whose collages appeared at the Leslie Lohman gallery in May and June of 2003, Mr. Kettelhack graduated from Middlebury College, has done graduate work in literature at the Bread Loaf School of English and Oxford University, and coursework in psychoanalysis at the Centers for Modern Pscyhoanalytic Studies in New York City and Brookline, Massachusetts. Mr. Kettelhack lives in Amityville, Long Island. His email address is: GuyBlakeKett@aol.com
Patrick Lawler has two collections of poetry published: A Drowning Man is Never Tall Enough by the University of Georgia Press (1990) and (reading a burning book) by Basfal Books (1994). Also, he has been awarded fellowships by the New York State Foundation for the Arts, the National Endowment of the Arts, and the Constance Saltonstall Foundation.
Fred Longworth co-hosts the open-mike reading at Twiggs Coffee & Tea in San Diego. His work has recently found homes in Pearl, Spillway and California Quarterly; and on-line at Poetic Voices, miller's pond and MiPo. His poem "Stillness" won first place in a January, 2003, contest sponsored by the California State Poetry Society.
Al Maginnes has published two collections of poetry, TAKING UP OUR DAILY TOOLS (St. Andrews College Press, 1997) and THE LIGHT IN OUR HOUSES (Pleaides Press, 2000). He has current or forthcoming poems in Tar River Poetry, Poetry East, Sow's Ear Poetry Review, Texas Review and Louisville Review. He teaches at Wake Technical Community College in Raleigh, NC.
Clay Matthews's work has been published recently or is forthcoming in magazines such as Poetry Midwest, Eclectica, storySouth, Taint, Big Muddy, Rock Salt Plum Poetry Review, Mudlark, the Oklahoma Review, and other fine print and internet publications. Recently, he had a poem nominated for a 2003 Pushcart. Currently, he is working towards a Ph.D. in creative writing at Oklahoma St. U. in Stillwater.
Jen Maxted was born in Iowa where she ran naked through corn fields as a child. She attended the Kansas City Art Institute from 1997-2002, graduating with a major in New Media. Her films, videos and paintings have been featured in screenings and galleries. Currently, she's creating an animated fiction that explores the natural sciences and art deco. She teaches at the University of Missouri Kansas City and at KCAI.
Sean McNulty lives in Dublin City. He has recently invented a collection of short stories entitled For Dora do. Currently, he is preparing two novels, At the Middle From the Start and Negatives. E-mail: seanmickie@yahoo.com
Wayne Miller has received a Ruth Lilly Fellowship, the Bess Hokin Prize and the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award. His chapbook, What Night Says to the Empty Boat (Notes for a Film in Verse) (of which these poems are part) will appear in 2005 from Greentower Press; other poems appear in Center, Crazyhorse, FIELD, The Laurel Review, LIT, Literary Imagination, The Paris Review and Sycamore Review. He teaches at Central Missouri State University and serves as poetry editor of Pleiades.
Simone Muench has poems forthcoming in Swink, River City and Samizdat. Her book The Air Lost in Breathing received the Marianne Moore Prize for Poetry and was published by Helicon Nine Editions in 2000. Notebook. Knife. Mentholatum., her chapbook, was recently released by New Michigan Press. Currently, she is Assistant Professor at Lewis University as well as a doctoral student at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Weblink: http://www.simonemuench.com
Niall Richard Murphy has been writing poetry since puberty, which probably explains a lot. He has been published in Electric Acorn and Dreamvirus. He lives and works in Dublin, Ireland.
Email address: niallm-poetry@enigma.ieChris O'Carroll is a writer, actor, stand-up comedian,
Pushcart Prize nominee, and Cambridge Poetry Award
recipient. He performs with People's Poetry Theatre
and Poetry Off Broadway. His poems have appeared in
Comrades, Eclectica, Snow Monkey, 3rd Muse, Thunder
Sandwich, and other journals, including two previous
issues of The Melic Review. He is the author of the
chapbook Shakespeare's Marijuana and Other Poems the
Authorities Don't Want You To Read (Antic Disposition
Press).
Jennifer Poteet Mallory lives in Glen Ridge, NJ with her husband and 4 male cats. She and her husband enjoy collecting antiques and selling them. Her great passions include Mexican religious artifacts and Scandanavian design. Jennifer's website can be viewed at: www.heelstone.com/jenniferpoteet. She has been published in many on line publications (once before in The Melic Review).
Phillip Routh has had stories published in Louisiana Literature, Third Coast and The South Carolina Review. He lives across the lake from New Orleans, where he thinks too much about the questions he poses at the end the end of "Writer Beware." He welcomes the thoughts of others at prou@bellsouth.net.
Jenni Russell was born in upstate New York and grew up in Bloomington Indiana. She is is a retired stripper currently writing a prose and poetry memoir about her ten-year career in the American sex industry. She has won the Poetry Board League and InterBoard Poetry Competition awards on the internet and has an actve interest in women’s issues and critical theory as well as creative writing. She writes full-time and resides in North Carolina.
Sumanta Sanyal is a freelance writer telecommuting out of Calcutta, India. He likes to write poetry, some of which gets published. He writes on a diverse range of subjects, especially Indian topics. He is deeply concerned about the underprivileged of the world but also acknowledges that beauty thrives, even in the deepest mire. This particular piece is a humorous one meant to lighten the moods of those who may tire from life's many vagaries. Email: sanshinerose@yahoo.com
Susanna Schrobsdorff is a freelance journalist living in Brooklyn. Her work has appeared in Parents, American Baby, Child and TIME Magazine. Her fiction and essays have been selected for BKYN, a Brooklyn online magazine of the arts and the Wordsmith reading series at Halcyon. She raises two feisty daughters and leads creative writing workshops for at-risk teenage girls in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brookyn. In another life, she was a Newsdesk Editor for TIME Magazine in New York, Paris and Brussels. Email: Schrobsdorff@yahoo.com
Paul Schulenburg is a painter who lives with his wife and dog in Maine.
Sarah Sloat was born many moons ago in central New Jersey and has since lived in China, Kansas, and Italy. She now works for a news agency in Frankfurt, Germany, where she lives with her husband, daughter and son. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Snakeskin, The Rose and Thorn, Pebble Lake Review and Simply Haiku, among others. Her email is sloatsj@yahoo.com
Evan Smith Rakoff's poetry has appeared in The Paris Review, Green Mountains Review and Ploughshares, among others. He has been a fellow at the Millay Colony, Ragdale, Yaddo, and The MacDowell Colony. A native of North Carolina, he lives in Manhattan with his wife, writer Joanna Smith Rakoff.
Virgil Suárez was born in Havana, Cuba in 1962. Since 1974 he has lived in the United States. He is the author of over twenty books of prose and poetry, most recently Infinite Refuge, Palm Crows, Banyan, and Guide to the Blue Tongue. In the Winter of 2005, the University of Pittsburg Press will publish 90 Miles: Selected and New Poems. He is the co-editor of four anthologies published by the University of Iowa Press: American Diaspora, Like Thunder, Vespers, and Red, White, and Blue. His poetry has been chosen for inclusion in BEST AMERICAN POETRY 2004. He is currently writing a new novel and restoring a '55 Chevrolet. He lives and works in Florida and loves the great city of Miami where he spends every chance he gets.
Michael Virga (MV) Before Melic sent a call out for Light Poetry this issue, I had e-submitted this to PLAYBOY. About a week later, I received an e-mail back thanking me, and explaining that the magazine isn't accepting poetry submissions, but closing by adding "they are fun to read." I have been at Poetry circa 1987, but Poetry has been at me since conception. My poems have appeared in various collegiate & professional electric & print journals, including Stirring & AMAZE. I am an IBPC Honorable Mention: March 2001 & 2004. I have been breaking bread at the Melic Roundtable since 1999, and I'm a stronger poet, and healthier person for it. mavbuon@hotmail.com
G.C. Waldrep's new book, Goldbeater's Skin, won the 2003 Colorado Prize for Poetry (judged by Donald Revell). Individual poems have appeared in Poetry, The Gettysburg Review, American Letters & Commentary, Tin House, and other journals. He is also the author of a nonfiction book, Southern Workers and the Search for Community (Illinois, 2000). Currently he divides his time between North Carolina and Iowa.
Les Wicks' books are The Vanguard Sleeps In (Glandular, 1981), Cannibals (Rochford St, 1985), Tickle (Island, 1993), Nitty Gritty (Five Islands, 1997), The Ways of Waves (Sidewalk, 2000) & Appetites of Light (Presspress, 2002).
....assembles an amazing cast of people in recognisable often dark places. With fine detail, their domestic & working lives are brilliantly portrayed. Anthony Lawrence
He's performed at festivals, schools, prisons etc. Runs workshops across Australia & is editor of Meuse Press which focuses on poetry outreach projects. http://leswicks.tripod.com/lw.htmA Seattle native now living in Spokane, Washington, Teresa White has been writing poetry since her early teens. During the past three years she's had over 220 poems published in 50 online and print journals. She is the author of one book of early poems In What Furnace? available through Amazon. In 1999 she was nominated for the Pushcart by the Melic Review. She has had several short stories published online in Cenotaph and is the author of two as yet unpublished novels. You may reach her at whiteheart_1998@yahoo.com.