90 magazine. She’s won many awards for both her poetry and journalism, including from the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, the Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Foundation, and the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies. Ela Harrison Gordon is a poet, translator, teacher and bluff-dweller. She is a first year student in the Rainier Writing Workshop, PLU’s low-residency MFA program. Shane Harms was born in Palmer, Alaska and grew up in Minnesota. He currently lives in Seattle, WA. His work has appeared in Northern Eclecta, Stone Hobo, Forty Ounce Bachelor, The Conium Review, The 555 Collective, and Quite Shorts. When he is not writing, he is foraging for mushrooms or gardening. Jacqueline Haskins is a biologist of wild wet places, from cypress swamps to glacial cirque swales. She is also an MFA student at the Whidbey Writer’s Workshop. Jackie’s poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction appear in Raven Chronicles, Meadowland Review, Shark Reef Literary Magazine, Inlandia Journal, Six Minute Magazine, Soundings Review, Bacopa Literary Review and Redheaded Stepchild. Max Hjortsberg is a poet and mapmaker who lives with his family in Livingston, MT. He is the author of the chapbook Bonnie & Clyde (An American Daydream). His poetry has also appeared in The Livingston Current, The Big Sky Journal and counterpunch.org. Dan Holiday had his first camera at age 8, a Kodak Brownie that cost his dad about $4. He had to scoop snow and mow yards to buy film and pay for the processing. And he still is doing things he would prefer not to do just to get another chance at doing better than he did when he was young. And still paying for the results.
CIRQUE Alaska. This is her second time appearing in Cirque. Simon Langham is a writer/performance artist who spent the last year seriously distracted by the circus arts as a clown, juggler, acrobat and trainer. Her poems and prose have appeared in Cirque, South Dakota Review, and VerbSap. Homer is home, a yurt on the hillside where the winter writing season unfolds. She intends to resist all temptations, stay chained to her desk and finish that manuscript, so she can finally recycle all those drafts to start her fires this winter. Charles Leggett is a professional actor based in Seattle, WA. Recent publications include poems nominated for the 2012 Pushcart Prize by Kansas City Voices and the Golden Sparrow Literary Review; his long poem “Premature Tombeau for John Ashbery” is an e-chapbook in the Barnwood Press “Great Find” series. Dan MacIsaac’s poetry has appeared in Wascana Review and The New Quarterly, and has previously appeared in the UK in magazines such as Weyfarers and Other Poetry. He has published short stories in numerous journals, including Dream Catcher, and has fiction forthcoming in Stand. His translations of the poetry of Lorca, Michelangelo, Ovid and others have been featured in a wide variety of literary magazines. Richard Mack is the author of a novel, Quail Song and three books of poetry and essays, Against a Western Sky, Among The Western Hills and Reflections in a Western River. His prose and poetry have been published in such journals as Red Cedar Review, Wind Literary Review, South Dakota Review, Salal Review, Clearwater Journal, Cape Rock, Branches, Green’s Magazine, Denver Post, Circus Maximus, Palouse Review and others. His poems have appeared in three Oregon anthologies RondeDance (Wordcraft Press), Deer Drink The Moon (Ooligan Press) and A Sense of Place (Oregon Libraries).
Hannah Hudson is seventeen years old, and is an eleventh grader at Lewis and Clark High School in Spokane, Washington. She enjoys writing prose and hopes to pursue the occupation but has also taken an interest in poetry. Hannah credits the writing of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Jane Austin and Margaret Mitchell as her greatest literary inspirations.
David McElroy lives in Anchorage and works as a pilot in the Arctic. He has a book of poems called Making It Simple and his poems have been published nationally in various journals.
Susheila Khera lives and works in Fairbanks, Alaska. Two of her poems appeared in the first issue of Cirque.
Stefon Mears is an MFA candidate at the Northwest Institute of Literary Arts. His recent publication credits include The Prose-Poem Project, KNOCK, Witches and Pagans, and Bacopa Literary Journal (www.stefonmears. com)
J.I. Kleinberg works and plays with words. She is co-author of the book Fat Stupid Ugly: One Woman’s Courage to Survive, is a past winner of the Sue Boynton Poetry Contest and blogs at http://chocolateisaverb.wordpress. com. She lives in Bellingham, Washington, and doesn’t own a television. Michael Kleven is a Seattle filmmaker and photographer. His company Kleven Creative Services produces independent film and commercial projects documenting nature, people and events in both stills and motion. Michael works on other film projects as director, DP and sound recordist. Some of his work can be seen here: www.michaelkleven.com Rich Kleven, photographer, prefers images from nature to portraiture or those from urban settings. His collections include shots from Yellowstone and from remote Alaska. Rich’s work has inspired younger photographers, especially, his son, Michael, who worked with him for many years. Sandra Kleven’s work has appeared in Cirque, Alaska Quarterly Review, Oklahoma Review, Praxilla, and Stoneboat. She’s received two Celebration Foundation grants for creative work. Kleven holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Alaska/Anchorage. Her sexual abuse prevention children’s book, Talk About Touch: Alaska, is due out in July (2012). She is taking over the editorship of Cirque from Mike Burwell. Emily Kurn is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Anchorage,
Suzanne Miles: As an immigrant from the Midwest, it’s the Alaskan light, mountains and myths that have captured her. In 1987 the US Army transferred her to Alaska; she’s been living in Eagle River, Alaska ever since. She completed her master’s degree in English at UAA and has been writing poetry for years, and fiction more recently. A few of her poems have been published in small journals and the anthology North of Eden: An Anthology of Alaskan Writings. She has been an adjunct English instructor for Alaska Career College and a volunteer with 49 Writers Group. These days, pastel portrait painting vies for place with poetry – but in Alaska, poetry insists – whatever else you do. Anne Millbrooke writes poetry, fiction, and non-fiction and is a history professor. Her poetry has previously appeared in Cirque. Since Keith Moul’s last appearance in Cirque, he’s published Beautiful Agitation, a 2011 winner in Red Ochre Press’ chapbook contest. It was released earlier this month. He’s also been very busy taking and editing new photos. Sharon Lask Munson is the author of the chapbook, Stillness Settles Down the Lane (Uttered Chaos Press, 2010) and a full-length book of poems, That Certain Blue (Blue Light Press, 2011). She taught for twenty years in Anchorage, Alaska. She is now retired and lives in Eugene, Oregon.