Hail to the Symptom

Gloria Heffernan is the author of the poetry collection, What the Gratitude List Said to the Bucket List (forthcoming from New York Quarterly Books), and the chapbook, Some of Our Parts, (Finishing Line Press, 2018), and Hail to the Symptom. Her work has appeared in over fifty journals including Chautauqua Literary Journal, Stone Canoe, Columbia Review, and The Healing Muse. She teaches at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, NY and holds an M.A. from New York University.

Here I Am Standing This Woman, This Me

Jerri Ketcham McDermott earned a Bachelor of Arts at Syracuse University and a Master’s at SUNY Albany. She is a former English teacher who later worked in environmental and scholarly publishing. She began writing at the age of twelve, with pieces in school and college literary magazines, and has continued writing ever since—fiction, nonfiction, family history, educational materials, and articles for special interest publications. She worked in Manhattan for several years and loves the city, but she was raised in upstate New York and traveled in many countries, as the daughter of a foreign language professor who loved to spend summers on the road. These experiences have given her a broad base of reference for personal reflections on the world and her connections with it. She posts new work on her Facebook website Jerri Ketcham McDermott, Poet.

 Makers and Keepers

Gail Mitchell received her MFA in Poetry from Drew University in 2017. This is her second book of poems. Her first book, Learning English the Cultural Way, was written after receiving her Masters in T.E.S.O.L. from West Chester University. Gail is a master quilt maker, poet, and a retired public school educator. She and her husband live in central New Jersey.

 Changing Conversations

Esther Schnur-Berlot was born and raised on the Lower East Side in New York City. Before finding her way to poetry, she worked behind the scenes in TV Commercials and owned Esther Street, a Jewish Soul Food Restaurant Gallery in New York’s Soho district.  Then on to California, she designed whimsical, wearable art that sold in Sonoma, Palm Springs and Tucson Galleries.  Now living in Arizona she devotes her time to writing poetry.  Her chapbook memoir, Changing Conversation, is filled with love, pain, tenderness, rancor, joy and grief of past voices that live in her ear.   Her poetry has appeared in California Poetry Review, Sonoma Poets Collection, Desert Voices, The Blue Guitar Magazine, Unstrung and Voices of Israel on line and in Poetica Magazine.

 Over/Time

Jonathon Todd is a poet and musician, living in South Philadelphia. His work deals with observations mainly written between breaks, trying to find humanity outside of and within labor. His work has been featured in Philadelphia Stories, The Lower East Side Review, and Shakefist Magazine among others.

 The Dresden Zoo

Robert Zaller is Drexel Distinguished University Professor of History Emeritus.  He is the author of six books and chapbooks of poetry:  The Year One; Lives of the Poet; Invisible Music, For Empedocles, Islands, and, with Moonstone Press, Speaking to Power.