Radio Free Albion

Chad Sweeney is a poet and translator. He is the author of four books of poetry, Wolf's Milk: The Lost Notebooks of Juan Sweeney (Forklift, 2012, bilingual English/Spanish), Parable of Hide and Seek (Alice James, 2010), Arranging the Blaze (Anhinga, 2009), and An Architecture (BlazeVox, 2007). He is the translator (from the Persian, with Mojdeh Marashi) of The Selected Poems of H.E. Sayeh: The Art of Stepping Through Time (White Pine, 2011).  He is the editor of Ghost Town, the online journal of poetry and prose at California State University, San Bernadino, where he teaches in the MFA program in poetry.

Nick Twemlow's first book of poems, Palm Trees, was published in 2012 by Green Lantern Press and was the winner of the 2013 Norma Farber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America.  He is a senior editor for The Iowa Review and co-editor of Canarium Books. 

Stephanie Strickland is the author of six books of print poetry, most recently Dragon Logic (Ahsahta Press, 2013), and seven electronic poems, most recently Sea and Spar Between, a poetry generator written with Nick Montfort using the words of Emily Dickinson and Moby-Dick.  Her award-winning works include V: WaveSon.nets / Losing L’una—soon to re-appear with a new mobile app—True North, The Red Virgin: A Poem of Simone Weil, and "The Ballad of Sand and Harry Soot."  (Photo by Star Black.)

Jan Beatty's fourth full-length book, The Switching/Yard, was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2013.  Library Journal named it one of ...30 New Books That Will Help You Rediscover Poetry. Beatty’s poem, "Youngest Known Savior," from The Switching/Yard, was chosen for the 2013 edition of the Best American Poetry. Other books include Red Sugar, finalist for the 2009 Paterson Poetry Prize; Boneshaker, finalist, Milton Kessler Award; and Mad River, winner of the Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize—all published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. A limited edition chapbook, Ravage, was published by Lefty Blondie Press in 2012. Another chapbook, Ravenous, won the 1995 State Street Prize.  She directs the creative writing program at Carlow University, where she runs the Madwomen in the Attic writing workshops and teaches in the MFA program.

Kate Greenstreet is currently on the road with her new book Young Tambling.  Her previous books are case sensitive and The Last 4 Things, all with Ahsahta Press. Her poetry can be found in Denver Quarterly, Chicago Review, Boston Review, and other journals. 

Adrian Matejka's most recent poetry collection, The Big Smoke, about the life of the boxer Jack Johnson, was published by Penguin in May 2013.  He is also the author of The Devil's Garden (Alice James Books, 2003) and Mixology (Penguin, 2009) which was a winner of the 2008 National Poetry Series.  He is the recipient of two Illinois Arts Council Literary Awards and fellowships from Cave Canem and the Lannan Foundation.  His work has appeared in American Poetry Review, The Best American Poetry, Ploughshares, and Poetry among other journals and anthologies.  You can click here to listen to him read the poem "The Battle of the Century," from The Big Smoke (discussed at 33:47 in this interview), at the jubilat website.  He teaches creative writing at Indiana University in Bloomington.

Shanna Compton's books include Brink (Bloof, 2013), For Girls & Others (Bloof, 2008), Down Spooky (Winnow, 2005), Gamers (Soft Skull, 2004), and several chapbooks. A book-length speculative poem called The Seam is forthcoming in 2014. Her work has been included in the Best American Poetry series and other anthologies, and recent poems have appeared in Verse Daily, Poetry Daily, Court Green, the Awl, and the Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day feature.

Larry Sawyer curates the Myopic Books Poetry Series and is also the co-director of The Chicago School of Poetics.  He was recently voted Best Poet by The Chicago Reader in its readers' poll for a second year. His books include Vertigo Diary (BlazeVox, 2013) and Unable to Fully California (Otoliths, 2010). His poetry and critical reviews have appeared or are forthcoming in Boston Review, Chicago Tribune, Coconut, Court Green, Exquisite Corpse, Forklift Ohio, Jacket (Australia), Matter, NY Arts Magazine, Paper Tiger (Australia), Ploughshares, The Prague Literary Review, Skanky Possum, Tabacaria (Portugal), Vanitas, Van Gogh's Ear (France), Versal (Holland), Verse Daily, and VLAK (France). He also edits www.milkmag.org with Lina ramona Vitkauskas.

Yona Harvey is the author of the poetry collection, Hemming the Water (Four Way Books, 2013), and the recipient of an Individual Artist Grant from The Pittsburgh Foundation. Her work has been published in jubilat, Gulf Coast, Callaloo, West Branch, and many other journals and anthologies, including A Poet's Craft: A Comprehensive Guide to Making and Sharing Your Poetry (ed. Annie Finch; University of Michigan Press, 2012). She lives with her husband and two children not far from where jazz pianist and composer Mary Lou Williams grew up. Williams married the spiritual to the secular in her music, and is a regular muse in Yona's writing.

Lina ramona Vitkauskas is the author of the epic poem Spiny Retinas (Mutable Sound, forthcoming, 2014); A Neon Tryst (Shearsman Books, 2013); Honey is a She (Plastique Press, 2012); The Range of Your Amazing Nothing (Ravenna Press, 2010); and Failed Star Spawns Planet/Star (dancing girl press, 2006). Past and forthcoming publications include work in Coconut, The Awl, Matter, Tarpaulin Sky, DIAGRAM, TriQuarterly, The Chicago Review, and The Toronto Quarterly, among others. She is the marketing director of the Chicago School of Poetics and co-edits the 14-year-running online literary journal, milk magazine.

Leonard Schwartz's most recent book is If (Talisman House, 2012). He is also the author of At Element (Talisman House, 2011), A Message Back and Other Furors (Chax Press, 2008), The Library of Seven Readings (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2008), and Language as Responsibility (Tinfish Editions, 2006), among others. He hosts and produces the radio program "Cross Cultural Poetics" and teaches at The Evergreen State College. (Photograph by Star Black.)

Susan M. Schultz's books include, most recently, "She's Welcome to Her Disease": Dementia Blog, Volume 2 (forthcoming, Singing Horse Press, 2013) and Memory Cards (2010-2011 Series) -- prose poems composed to fit on a time card or index card (Singing Horse, 2011). She is the editor of the anthology Jack London Is Dead: Contemporary Euro-American Poetry in Hawai'i (and Some Stories), which was published in 2012 by Tinfish Press. Susan's critical work includes the book, A Poetics of Impasse in Modern and Contemporary Poetry (Univ. of Alabama Press, 2005). She founded Tinfish Press in 1995. Susan lives and teaches in Hawai'i and is a lifelong fan of the St. Louis Cardinals.

Joe Harrington is the author of Things Come On (an amneoir) (Wesleyan Poetry 2011), a mixed-genre work relating the twinned narratives of the Watergate scandal and his mother's cancer. Harrington is also the author of he chapbooks Earth Day Suite (Beard of Bees Press 2010 -- available as free PDF) and Of Some Sky (Bedouin, forthicoming), as well as the critical study Poetry and the Public: The Social Form of Modern U.S. Poetics (Wesleyan UP 2002). He was the 2005 Walt Whitman Chair of American Literature and Culture at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands, under the auspices of the Fulbright Distinguished Chairs Program. He is currently Professor of English at the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

CM Burroughs is the author of the poetry collection The Vital System (Tupelo Press, 2012). She was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and earned degrees from Sweet Briar College and the University of Pittsburgh. She has been awarded fellowships from Yaddo, The MacDowell Colony, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Idyllwild Arts, and Cave Canem Foundation. Both the Studio Museum of Harlem and the Warhol Museum have commissioned her to create poetry in response to art installations. She lives in Chicago, where she is the Elma Stuckey Emerging-Poet-in-Residence at Columbia College Chicago. She will join the Core Poetry Faculty at Columbia College in Fall 2013.

Hannah Gamble is the author of the poetry collection Your Invitation to a Modest Breakfast (Fence, 2012), which was one of the winners of 2011 National Poetry Series Competition, selected by Bernadette Mayer. Hannah has received writing and teaching fellowships from Rice University, the University of Houston, and The Edward F. Albee Foundation. Her poems and interviews appear or are forthcoming in American Poetry Review, jubilat, The Laurel Review, Indiana Review, and Ecotone, among others. She teaches English at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside and lives in Chicago.  

Sandra Simonds is the author of Mother was a Tragic Girl (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2012) and Warsaw Bikini (Bloof Books, 2008). Her poems have been published in Poetry, The Believer, The American Poetry Review, Fence, and Court Green, among others. She lives in Tallahassee, Florida, and is an Assistant Professor of English at Thomas University in Georgia.

Michael McColly's recent book is the memoir The After-Death Room (Soft Skull Press), which chronicles his journey through several countries affected by the AIDS epidemic -- South Africa, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Senegal, and the United States. The After-Death Room won the 2007 Lambda Award for Best Spiritual Writing. Michael holds an M.A. in religious studies from University of Chicago and an M.F.A. from the University of Washington. He teaches creative writing in the B.A. and M.F.A. programs at Columbia College Chicago and Northwestern University. His website is http://mikemccolly.com.

David Trinidad's most recent book is Dear Prudence: New and Selected Poems, which was published last year by Turtle Point Press. Peyton Place: A Haiku Soap Opera is forthcoming from Turtle Point in 2013. David lives in Chicago, where he teaches poetry at Columbia College and co-edits Court Green.