Frank X Walker

Frank X Walker is the author of four poetry collections: When Winter Come: the Ascension of York (University Press of Kentucky, 2008); Black Box (Old Cove Press, 2005); Buffalo Dance: the Journey of York (University Press of Kentucky, 2003), which won the Lillian Smith Book Award in 2004; and Affrilachia (Old Cove Press, 2000). A 2005 recipient of the Lannan Literary Fellowship in Poetry, Walker serves as Writer in Residence and lecturer of English at Northern Kentucky University and is the proud editor and publisher of PLUCK!, the new Journal of Affrilachian Art & Culture. [ Read his full bio. ] On Frank "The work of Frank X Walker is an eclectic, powerful mixture of liberating style, profound insight, and unwavering organic connection to the intellectual, political, and cultural struggles of a people. He stands in the tradition of DuBois, McKay, Robeson, Hughes, and other great writers, poets and performers whose contributions have transcended time and space to give generation after generation pause and hope." — Ricky L. Jones, author of Black Haze On Buffalo Dance: the Journey of York "An ardently imagined and gloriously vivid first-person account of York’s awe over the munificent and daunting wilderness, and instant rapport with the Indians he meets.”— Booklist (starred review) “A brave collection of poems. . . . Brims with the rich complexity of York’s condition in a way that will appeal to a wide audience.”— Louisville Courier-Journal

Lee Ann Brown

Born in Japan, Lee Ann Brown is a filmmaker, performer, and writer who has lived in Charlotte, North Carolina, Providence, Rhode Island, The Bay Area, New York City, and Boulder, Colorado. She is currently on the faculty of the Naropa Institute's Writing and Poetics Program in Boulder, Colorado. She is also founder and editor of Tender Buttons Press (http://www.tenderbuttons.net/) Books Polyverse (Los Angeles: Sun & Moon Press, 1999) Chapbooks Sustain Petal (New York: BOOG Literature, 1999) Velocity City (Elmwood, CT: Potes & Poets Press, 1994) Crush (Buffalo: Leave Books, 1993) I like the use of emes, with Liz Fodaski and Ted Pearson (Providence, RI: Tender Buttons Press, 1993) A Museme (New York: BOOG Literature, 1993) Poems (Santa Cruz, CA: We Press, 1993) Sappho Poems, with Jennifer Moxley (Providence, RI: Big Weeds, 1992) Cultivate (New York: Tender Buttons Press, 1991)

Holly Iglesias

Holly Iglesias is the winner of the 2008 Kore Press First Book Award. She is a poet and translator whose work has appeared in Prairie Schooner, The Prose Poem, Arts & Letters, Barrow Street, Margie, Crab Orchard Review, Massachusetts Review and Spoon River Poetry Review. She has been awarded fellowships by the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the Edward Albee Foundation. She is the author of two chapbooks, Hands-on Saint and Good Long Enough, winner of Thorngate Road’s Frank O’Hara Prize. A critical work, Boxing Inside the Box: Women's Prose Poetry, was published by Quale Press. She teaches at University of North Carolina-Asheville and at Warren Wilson College.

Gary Copeland Lilley

Gary Copeland Lilley is a graduate of the Warren Wilson College MFA Program. His publications include four books of poetry: full length collections, The Subsequent Blues (Fourway Books, 2004), and Alpha Zulu (Ausable Press, forthcoming 2008), and two chapbooks, The Reprehensibles (Fractual Edge Press, 2004), and Black Poem (Hollyridge Press, 2005). He teaches undergraduate creative writing at Warren Wilson College.

doris davenport

Performance poet, writer, educator, also a visual artist and dancer, doris davenport earned her Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. She has participated in more than 100 poetry performances and workshops, and has taught in the areas of African American studies, multi-ethnic literature, women’s studies and creative writing. Davenport has published five books of poetry, numerous articles, essays, book reviews and one play, drawing inspiration from the people and environments of Northeast Georgia and the beauty and mystery in the foothills of Appalachia. In November 2005, she was named one of two “expatriate” North Carolina Poets of the Week by Kathryn Stripling Byer, North Carolina’s poet laureate. “No one can spin a story quite like doris,” says Byer. “A performance poet par excellence, she brings her strength, beauty, and morning-glory humor to every reading she gives.”