C I R Q U E
Jeff Oliver: Jeffery Oliver reads, writes, skis and bikes in and around Anchorage. He is a recent graduate of the MFA program in Creative Writing & Literary Arts at the University of Alaska Anchorage. Coco Owen: Coco Owen is a stay-at-home poet in Los Angeles. She lived in Oregon for five years and always loved driving the beautiful Columbia River Highway. She is a psychologist by training and serves on the board of the independent publisher, Les Figues Press. Her poems have also appeared in the Antioch Review, 1913: A Journal of Forms, The Journal and Umbrella Journal. Jeremy Pataky: Jeremy Pataky earned an MFA in poetry from the University of Montana. His work has appeared in Black Warrior Review, The Southeast Review, Left Facing Bird, Square Lake, Anchorage Press, Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Public Radio, and others. He is the Executive Director of the Wrangell Mountains Center and a founding board member of the 49 Alaska Writing Center. Tanya Perkins: Tanya Perkins lives on the shores of Puget Sound with her husband, daughter and assorted critters. Her non-fiction, fiction and poetry has appeared in Chronogram, Jeopardy, The Writer’s Block, Wilderness House Review and Whatcom Magazine. She is currently working on a novel. Jim Petit: James Petit grew up on Willapa Bay in southwest Washington and lived in Alaska for 35 years. He is a poet, writer, fisherman and teacher. He has taught in Alaska, Washington, Luxembourg and Germany and now lives in Montreal. His poetry and nonfiction have appeared in various journals. He has just completed his first non-fiction book. Doug Pope: Doug Pope is a lifelong Alaskan who writes nonfiction, fiction, and poetry. His non-fiction pieces “Kayaking adventure was a wrestle with the elements,” and “Float trip delivers a rainbow of fun,” were awarded 2nd place in the 2007 NFPW contest in nature writing. “Raven’s Confession” was a 2007 runner-up in the Anchorage Press Super Shorts Contest. His poems have appeared in the anthology 50 Poems for Alaska and in Issue #1 of Cirque. He lives in Hope and Anchorage with his wife Beth. Vivian Faith Prescott: Vivian Faith Prescott is a fifth generation Alaskan of Sáami and Suomalainen heritage. She was born and raised in Wrangell, Alaska and now lives in Sitka, Alaska with her husband, two dogs and a cat. Her poetry has been published in Avoset: A Journal of Nature Poems, Tidal Echoes 2007, Tidal Echoes 2009, Ice Box and Permafrost. She was a recent finalist for the 2008 Joy Harjo Poetry Award from Cutthroat, A Journal of the Arts. With Alicia Ristau, she organized a Southeast Alaska Community Writers’ Show “Rouge et Noir” at the Silverbow in Juneau, Alaska in spring 2009--a celebration of Alaskan writers and a chance for emerging artists to have a debut reading.
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Angela Ramirez: Angela Ramirez is an edgy Anchorage artist and blogger who gets around winter and summer on her bicycle and publishes “Life in Spenard: One artist, one bike, and a love of the human skull” at lifeinspenard.wordpress. com/ Bob Ritchie: Bob Ritchie has lived in Alaska since 1972 after hitching up the Alcan Highway in 1970. He works as a biologist in Fairbanks. Family, friends and time spent with wildlife in remote parts of Alaska are key themes in his poetry. Besides natural history articles in professional journals, Bob hasn’t published his writings. Alicia Ristau: Alicia Ristau was born in 1973 in Fairbanks, Alaska and was raised in Nice, France. She is pursuing an MFA in creative writing via the University of Alaska, Anchorage’s low residency program. When enrollment permits, she works as an English and French Adjunct Faculty for the University of Alaska, Southeast. With Vivian Faith Prescott, she organized a Southeast Alaska Community Writers’ Show “Rouge et Noir” at the Silverbow in Juneau, Alaska in spring 2009. Suzanne Scarfone: Suzanne Scarfone’s poems have appeared in Phoebe: A Journal of Feminist Scholarship, Cider Press Review, Earth’s Daughters, Natural Bridge: A Journal of Contemporary Literature, Ducts, FRIGG, and Poetry Repairs. Scarfone is an English Romantic Poetry and Virginia Woolf scholar, is a creative writing teacher with the Afghan Women’s Writing project as well as Education Director and writer-inresidence with InsideOut Literary Arts project in Detroit. Linda Schandelmeier: Linda Schandelmeier lives in Fairbanks, AK. She is the author of Listening Hard Among the Birches, a collection of poetry published by Vanessapress. She received a Rasmuson Individual Project Award in 2007 to work on a manuscript about the 160 acres near Anchorage where she grew up. This poem is from that manuscript, called Homestead. Tom Sexton: Tom Sexton’s 12th collection of poetry, I Think Again of Those Ancient Chinese Poets, will be published by the University of Alaska Press in March 2011. He was appointed Alaska’s poet laureate in 1994. Suanne Sikkema: Suanne Sikkema finds inspiration in the natural world. Sometimes she remembers to bring her camera with her and takes great joy in photographing the outdoors. She has a passion for plants, owns the small company Arctic Sun Gardening in Anchorage and loves to travel. Leslea Smith: Leslea Smith is a student in the low-residency MFA program at the University of Alaska, Anchorage. Her poems have appeared in Verseweavers. She was born in Sitka, Alaska and lives in Hillsboro, Oregon, where she practices poverty law and watches birds.