Judith Barrington is the author of three books of poetry, Horses and the Human Soul, published in 2004 by Story Line Press, and Trying to Be an Honest Woman and History and Geography, published by Eighth Mountain Press. Her book, Lifesaving: A Memoir, won the Lambda Book Award. Judith has taught creative writing at various universities and summer workshops for the past twenty-five years and is the author of Writing the Memoir: From Truth to Art. She also edited the anthology An Intimate Wilderness: Lesbian Writers on Sexuality.

M. Wescott Berton teaches high school life skills. He is reading William Gaddis and Francisco X. Alarcon. His poetry publications include Megalopsychia, Snow Monkey, Transcend The Bull, Pacific Review, The Serial Vox Review, Freudian Shrimp, and others.

Michelle Brooks  holds a doctorate in creative writing from the University of North Texas. Her fiction and poetry has been published or is forthcoming in Alaska Quarterly Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Madison Review, Blue Mesa Review, Eclipse, Baltimore Review, Cold Mountain Review, Phoebe, and many others. Her poem, “Attention” has recently been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and her first chapbook, No Half-Measures Here, won the Ledge Press Award in 2004.

Alan Catlin lives in Schenectady, NY.

David Christensen is a San Francisco writer and musician whose work appears in I Do/I Don’t: Queers on Marriage, Gertrude 2005, Underground Voices, Inside Him, and Sodom and Me: Queers on Fundamentalism.

Bree Coven was a regular columnist for the nation’s best-selling lesbian magazine, Curve, for three years. She has also written for New York magazine, Seattle magazine, Seattle Weekly, On our Backs, Msn.com, and 20 anthologies, including Best of the Best Lesbian Erotica, Best of Both Worlds: Bisexual Erotica, and Trans Figures: Transgender Erotica. She co-authored the book Shecky’s NYC Apartment Guide (Hangover Media). Bree wrote “The D Poem” for a poetry class at Sarah Lawrence College, where it got her in a bit of trouble.

 Steven F. Dansky, a long-time political activist and writer, was a founder of the modern gay liberation movement in 1969.  His writing spans more than four decades and has been cited in nearly every early book on gay liberation.  His writing has been reviewed in The New York Times by Martin Duberman and the Village Voice by Jill Johnston.  He has written for Come Out!, The New York Free Press, I-Kon, Double-F: A Magazine of Effeminism, SoHo Weekly News, Basta, and Faggotry.  As a poet, he has read at the Hunter College Gallery, Matrix Theatre, I-Kon Bookstore, and A Different Drummer.  He is the author of two books on HIV, Now Dare Everything: Tales of HIV-Related Psychotherapy (Haworth Press, 1994) and Nobody’s Children: Orphans of the HIV Epidemic (Haworth Press, 1997).  His work on healthcare was published in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice; Research Letter, Beth Israel Medical Center, New York; Canadian Family Physician; and GMHC Training Manual. He attended under- and graduate school at Hunter College, City University of New York.  He received post-graduate training at the Institute for Human Identity, New York.  He was an Instructor of Pediatrics, Albany Medical College and was a guest lecturer at the School of Social Welfare, State University of New York.  Dansky is a licensed psychotherapist and had practices in New York City and Albany, New York. His book Broken Gender & Other Stories is in preparation.  He and Barry Safran were married in 2004 and divide their time in New York and Las Vegas.

Having survived a New England boyhood, adolescence on a ranch in Montana, three graduate schools, a Roman Catholic monastery, and better living through chemistry, Austin Gray now counsels addicts at a hospital in Portland, Oregon.

Allison Joseph is a poet on the faculty at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Confluence, The Litchfield Review, Writers’ Notes, and The Homestead Review.

Megan Kruse is a lesbian poet and fiction writer living and working in Portland, OR. She holds a degree from Oberlin College and currently works as an emergency services specialist for domestic violence survivors.  Her work has appeared in Oyez Review, Bellingham Review, Fiddlehead, Phoebe, and the first volume from Vespertine Press.  She has been the recipient of residency grants from the Kimmel Center in Nebraska, the Ragdale Foundation, and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico.  In 2006 she received a fellowship from Oregon Literary Arts and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Amanda Laughtland lives with her partner, Tanya, in the suburbs of Seattle, where she teaches English composition part-time at Edmonds Community College and works part-time behind the circulation desk in a public library. Her poems appear in recent issues of Heliotrope, Knock, and QP: Queer Poetry.

gary lundy has had poetry in a variety of magazines and journals in the united states and canada. most recently his poems have appeared in red owl, iodine poetry journal, edgz, plain brown wrapper, moria poetry journal, pacific coast journal, alice blue, and fluent ascension. he has poems forthcoming in pudding magazine, snow monkey, karamu, ginosko, buckle &, clara venus, and heeltap. gary is a professor of english at the university of montana-western in dillon, montana, where he teaches literature and creative writing and advises the student lgbt club lambda alliance. in his spare time he builds acoustic guitars and mandolins.

Yasmina Maghrib was born in Belgium of a Ukrainian-Greek mother and a Walloon father. She has lived in Russia, Spain, Mexico, Belgium, and traveled throughout the world. She received her degree in Latin Studies from University of Alaska in 1988 and now lives in front of a volcano and glaciers. She was published in Gertrude in 2002 and is presently working on a novel, set in Mexico.

Robert McDonald’s poetry has appeared in the New York Quarterly, Red Cedar Review, Southern Poetry Review, paragraph, and American Scurvy, among other journals and zines. He lives in a cute little coachhouse, works as a bookseller in Chicago, and his book A Field Guide to Gay and Lesbian Chicago has just been released by Lake Claremont Press.

Tricia McInroy has been making a living as a photographer for more than ten years with photos appearing in daily newspapers, magazines, and books. Currently she is pursuing a master’s in visual arts through Vermont College and volunteering to teach youth in prison photography through a program called Fresh Eyes. She lives with her partner in Albuquerque.

Trudi Muro works for the University of Texas at Arlington, and credits her Dallas Poets Community friends for pushing her to submit poetry more than her usual annual submission.  A self-professed bibliophile, she is currently plotting how much more book weight her bookcases will bear before toppling over.

Kent Nielsen was born and raised in Nebraska. He is a veteran teacher, having taught on the high school level for over ten years. He received his M.A. in Poetry from Florida State University. Currently, he is attending the MFA Poetry program at Antioch University in Los Angeles. He was a finalist in the 2006 Annual Poetry Chapbook Contest at Gertrude Press. Recently he has had several poems published with KNOCK and Avon Street Press.

Tammy Remington grew up in rural Ohio, escaped to the big city of Cleveland when she was eighteen and expected to make a name for herself as an artist. It didn’t work out that way and she developed other skills: shooting pool and drinking. At the age of 35, she began to study writing at Cleveland State University. In 2000, she applied to Columbia University’s School of General Studies and was accepted, moving to New York over Christmas break. She currently lives in Harlem with her partner, holding down a day job as editorial assistant on a scientific journal as well as freelancing and working on her first novel.

Lisa Rosen teaches part-time at the local community college. Her work has been published in Bellevue Literary Revue, Poetry East, and Kaleidoscope, among other journals.

Elizabeth Simson’s first chapbook, Sea Change, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2005. Her poetry has appeared in Atlanta Review, Kalliope, Earth’s Daughters, and elsewhere. She lives alone in a little village on Mt. Hood, Oregon.

Alan Witchey was born and raised in Indiana but left to find the modern world. He currently resides in Irvine, CA, and enjoys playwriting and fiction writing because they’re cheaper than therapy. Having earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University in 2005, he plans to write an award winning novel in the near future or drink excessively.

D’Anne Witkowski is not down with poetic elitism. She is a uniter, not a divider, unlike our current president. D’Anne also makes wonderful vegan cupcakes and loves her wife, Stacy, and her dog, Henri, a miniature poodle. Though she has been told she doesn’t seem like the type of person to have that type of dog, she does and she is. D’Anne has had poems featured in Rattle and Gertrude and begins her grand MFA journey at the University of Michigan next month.