MARK AMES is the founding editor of "The eXile," a Moscow-based English-language newspaper and web magazine, co-author of the book "The eXile: Sex, Drugs and Libel in the New Russia" with Matt Taibbi, and author of "V Rossiu s Lubovyu," a collection of translated columns published in Russia. He is a regular contributor to The New York Press and has been published in the Nation, Playboy, The San Jose Mercury News, Metro Silicon Valley and several Russian newspapers including Kommersant and Limonka. He has lived in Russia for most of the last ten years.

TONY BROWN is a poet from Worcester, MA, and has been publishing for many years. His work has appeared in various magazines, and was included in "100 Poets Against the War" (2003, Salt Publishing, London).

JANE CASSADY runs a weekly reading series in Syracuse, NY. She is the author of three chapbooks and has appeared in The Seneca Review, The Comstock Review, Valley of the Contemporary Poets, and "Incidental Buildings and Accidental Beauty" (an anthology of Orange County Poets, 2001). She has featured at such venues as V.C.P. and Beyond Baroque in Los Angeles, The Poets' Asylum in Worcester, MA, and Mini-Wave for ThINC in Syracuse. She has workshopped with accomplished poets such as Patricia Smith and Ellen Bass. She's an undergraduate in Art History at Syracuse University and lives in Syracuse with her wife and their cat, Arlo.

LEA C. DESCHENES is a 2004 recipient of Worcester's Jacob Knight award & once found a five-leaf clover during a solar eclipse. A graphic/web designer by day, she is the author ten self-published chapbooks, most recently, "Bad For Me: Love Poems," and shopping four full-length poetry manuscripts. Her work has appeared internationally, including Spillway, Blue Satellite, Snakeskin, 2x4, "Incidental Buildings & Accidental Beauty" and "So Luminous the Wildflowers."

JERRY GARCIA is a native of Los Angeles who is too old to have been named after The Grateful Dead guitar hero. Besides, his parents weren't that hip. He spent his childhood fearing "the bomb" and was a teenager during the "Summer of Love." He studied Communication Arts at Loyola Marymount University during the Watergate Era and became a film editor the year Annie Hall won the Oscar for Best Picture. He has produced and edited television commercials, documentaries and industrial films. His interest in poetry resurfaced in the 1990s when he attended classes in the Writer's Program at UCLA. He has read his work at local poetry venues in Los Angeles and is currently working on a chapbook to be titled: "Hitchhiking with the Guilty."

THERESA CECILIA GARCIA is a former elementary school teacher turned writer and has been a member of Francis Ford Coppola's Zoetrope site for a year now. Apart from writing poetry, she also ventures into flash fiction, short stories, screenplays and songwriting.

ELIZABETH P. GLIXMAN is a poet, artist, and writer living in the USA. Her work has appeared in online and print publications including southstory, 3 A.M.Magazine, Wicked Alice, Frigg, Tough Times Companion, a publication of the Institute on Violence and Survival at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, and several poetry and mass market story anthologies. She is presently looking for a publisher for her book of poems, "Voices In The Night."

LIZ GONZÁLEZ grew up in Rialto, California, a town about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. She lived in Los Angeles from 1990 to 1996, and then she moved to Oakland where she earned an MFA in English and Creative Writing at Mills College. In the 1999/2000 school year, she was writer in residence at the Phoenix College Creative Writing Program, and she lived in Phoenix for eleven months. Currently, she lives in Long Beach, CA. Her work has recently appeared in or will soon appear in "Women on the Edge: Writing from Los Angeles," "Open Windows: An anthology of five Poetry in the Windows Projects," Heliotrope, Comet, and So Luminous the Wildflowers: An Anthology of California Poets. Beneath Bone, a volume of her poetry, was published by Manifest Press in 2000.

S.A. GRIFFIN is the author of several books, including "A One Legged Man Standing Casually On Hollywood Blvd. Smoking A Cigarette" (1989, Shelf Life Press), "Heaven Is One Long Naked Dance" (1993, Rose of Sharon Press), and "Twisted Cadillac: A Spoken Word Odyssey "(with the Carma Bums, 1996, Sacred Beverage Press) and Co-Editor of "The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry" (1999, Thunder's Mouth Press).

BOB HOEPPNER was born in Connecticut and was raised there and in NY, OK, and IL. As a teenager, he joined the Navy where he earned his dolphins serving on a nuclear fast attack submarine. After leaving the Navy he lived in Times Square and wrote plays, getting one staged reading on Off Off Broadway. He's been a featured reader at Jester's Café in Westfield, and continues reading there and at several other venues throughout Western Mass.

JOSEPH HUTCHISON was born and raised in Denver, Colorado, where he makes his living as a writer and sometime college instructor. He is the author of 11 collections of poems, including "The Rain At Midnight" (2000), "Bed of Coals" (winner of the 1994 Colorado Poetry Award), "House of Mirrors" (1992), "The Undersides of Leaves" (1985), and the 1982 Colorado Governor's Award volume, "Shadow-Light." His poems and short stories have appeared in over 100 journals and in several anthologies. He lives in the mountains southwest of Denver with his wife, Melody.

RACHEL KANN won the LA Weekly Award in 2004, has performed in venues from California Plaza to Disney Concert Hall to Royce Hall to The Palace of Fine Arts to Nuyorican Poets Café, with Rahzel (The Roots), Mike Watt and Tre (Pharcyde), has published 4 book and produced 3 CDs, appears in anthologies like "So Luminous the Wildflowers" (Tebot Bach Press) and compilation CDs like "Tack Fu Presents: The 85 Decibel Monks" (Rosemary Records) and produces, "co-lab:ORATION" at The Temple Bar in Santa Monica.

DAVID MACPHERSON lives in Worcester, Massachusetts.

DANIEL MCGINN is a native of Southern California. His poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including: Spillway, 51%, OC Weekly, FTS, Blue Satellite, and the 1999 Valley Contemporary Poetry Anthology. He is the author of several chapbooks, including "Amateur Surrealist Descending a Staircase," "For Lori," and "Chemistry Set" (written in collaboration with his wife Lori.)

RICHARD MODIANO studied American poetry from Colonial era to the late 19th century, with special attention to post-Whitman developments & democratization of poetry with introduction of open form & demotic speech as alternative to closed form & elite language. By college entrance discovered & was encouraged by Imagist & Objectivist poetics of direct treatment of the thing itself (whether subjective or objective), freedom of subject matter, hard & clear expression to scribble a few pieces to test understanding. Later mid-1970s studied Olson's Projective Verse poetic of composition by field and that the poem is energy transferred. Also attended Allen Ginsberg's workshop at NYC Dharmadhatu 1976 & got introduced to Asian poetics via Japanese haiku & tanka forms, and got the benefit of Ginsberg's synthesis of Objectivist school, Projective verse, classical Japanese poetics, Spontaneous Bop Prosody & First Thought Best Thought. 1980s deepened interest in Japanese aesthetics & learned Japanese language & was consultant-editor for Subterranean Press. Early '90s started translating from Japanese to English, wrote terser Japanese-influenced pieces. Translations & original works published here & there in Blue Satellite, FTS, & Sun Flowers & Locomotives.

GABRIEL ROSENSTOCK is a poet, haikuist and translator living in Dublin, Ireland, and author/translator of over 100 books, mostly in Irish.

SKIP SHEA is an artist, activist and currently President of the Center for Peaceful Living Inc. He has been part of the "Culture of Peace" exhibit of Art & Poetry and is currently exhibiting and performing his exhibit, "Catholic Boy (Surviving Abuse)" He resides in Uxbridge, MA.

JACKIE SHEELER is a native New Yorker, an award-winning writer, and a renegade. Her first collection of poems, "The Memory Factory," won the Magellan Prize from Buttonwood Press in 2002. Her second book, "Off the Cuffs," an anthology of police poetry, was published by Soft Skull Press in February 2003 to rave reviews. Jackie founded the Poetz.com website and founded the Pink Pony West poetry reading series which is now held weekly at the Cornelia Street Café. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Painted Bride Quarterly, Phoebe, The Ledge, Rattapallax, Slant, Midnight Mind, New York Press and many other journals. She's performed on FM radio and cable TV, and has featured at venues throughout the US, including Symphony Space, The Nuyorican Poets Cafe, The Knitting Factory and The Bowery Poetry Club, where she often performs her with her band, Talk Engine.

THOMAS R. SMITH is the author of three published books of poems, "Keeping The Star" (New Rivers Press, 1988), "Horse Of Earth" (Holy Cow! Press, 1994) and "The Dark Indigo Current" (Holy Cow! Press, 2000). He has also edited a selection of the Canadian poet Alden Nowlan for U.S. audiences, "What Happened When He Went To The Store For Bread" (Thousands Press). He has been active in Poets Against the War readings in the Midwest and in 2004 published a chapbook, "Peace Vigil: Poems For An Election Year (And After)," as a statement against the Iraq War. He has pledged to keep that Chapbook in print until the end of the Bush presidency, and copies can be ordered for $6 postpaid from the author at 523 State St., River Falls, WI 54022.

ELLA SPRINK is a hopeless idealist. There appears to be nothing she can do about this state of being. However, it seems there are some things she can do because of it. She lives in the middle of the desert in New Mexico with her devastatingly handsome husband and their befuddlingly charismatic dog. They spend their time wandering around Native America and teaching music to kids. This is, they claim, good work if you can find it.

J.E. STANLEY is an accountant and on-again/off-again guitarist from the grayscale suburban wilderness of Northeast Ohio. His poetry has appeared in numerous publications including the chapbook "Dissonance" (deep cleveland press) and the short collection Ink (Gypsy Lips Press).

TODD SWIFT was born in Montreal, Good Friday 1966, but has lived in Europe (Budapest, Paris and now London) for much of the past decade. He is the author of three collections of poems, most recently "Rue du Regard" (DC Books, 2004); and an editor of five poetry anthologies, such as "100 Poets Against The War" (Salt, 2003). He is poetry editor of online journal Nthposition. He recently guest-edited the special section "The New Canadian Poetry" for the 2005 issue of New American Writing. In 2004 he was the Oxfam Poet In Residence, supported by an Arts Council England grant. Poems of his have recently appeared or are due to appear in: Agenda, Books in Canada, Cordite, The Daily Telegraph, Gargoyle, Jacket, The London Magazine, Magma, and Poetry Wales. His poetry recently aired on the BBC's Poems By Post read by actor Henry Goodman. He has been a guest reader at The Frankfurt Book Fair, The Dylan Thomas Centre and Shakespeare and Co, among other venues. He appears in the new anthology of contemporary Canadian poets, "Open Field," from New York's Persea Books.

FISH VARGAS is a Bronx born Nuyorican poet. He has shared his words of power and experience at countless poetry venues, fundraisers, festivals and universities throughout NYC and the United States. He has been a featured performer at Cornelia Street Cafe, First Wednesday for the Bronx Council on the Arts, Universal hip-hop Parade in honor of Marcus Garvey, Uppercase at Bar 13, Illinois State University, University of William Paterson, University of Albany, University of Ramapo. He was a featured performer at Voice for the Voiceless in Amherst College in Massachusetts 2003 and 2004. In 2004 he claimed victory against 34 slam masters competing on a national level. He is a founding member Acentos Bronx Poetry Showcase based in the Mott Haven section of the Bronx. He is the co-host of louder Monday at Bar 13. He also is a member of the LouderARTS Project Artist organization. He facilitates workshops for the Osborne Association/Freshstart Program at Rikers Island teaching inmates creative writing and poetry for 3 years running.

LAURA LEE WASHBURN is an Associate Professor at Pittsburg State University, an editorial board member of the Woodley Memorial Press, and the author of This Good Warm Place (March Street, 1998) and Watching the Contortionists (Palanquin Chapbook Prize, 1996). Her poetry has appeared in such journals as Quarterly West, The Sun, The Journal, and Clackamas Review. Born in Virginia Beach, Virginia and currently residing in Kansas, she has also lived and worked in Arizona and Missouri. Her poem "Parens Patriae" appeared previously in Red Rock Review'.

LENORE WEISS lives in Oakland, CA, the daughter of Hungarian-American immigrants. Originally, from the South Bronx, she is a child of cities. The language and music of the urban scape is always in her ears. Her poetry has been published with Paterson Literary Review, les cahiers des femmes, Prism, Tiger's Eye, Red Hills Review, Blue Collar Review, Raven Chronicles, FrogPond, Praxis, Room, Androgyne, Verbum, Mosaic, The Graybook, The Louisville Review, Contemporary Women Poets, Tunnel Road, and Alpha Beat Soup . In 2003 she was named as a finalist in the Poet & Writers "California Voices" contest. In 2002, the Bay Area Poets Coalition awarded her first place in their "midi-category" for poetry. Her essay, "Stranger in Paradigm" was published by Allyn and Bacon, 2001, in "Writing A Professional Life: Stories of Technical Communicators On and Off the Job."