Carolyn Beard Whitlow, a Cave Canem poet and co-editor of Obsession: Sestinas in the 21st Century, has poetry in Villanelles: Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets; A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry; and Home is Where: An Anthology of African American Poets.

Marilyn Nelson’s books include The Homeplace, The Fields of Praise, Carver, Fortune’s Bones, The Freedom Business, A Wreath for Emmett Till, and Faster than Light. The 2012 recipient of the Robert Frost Medal, she was Poet Laureate of Connecticut for five years and founder/director of Soul Mountain Retreat.

Herman Beavers is associate professor of English and Africana Studies. He teaches courses in Post WWII African American literature and creative writing. His most recent poems have appeared in The Langston Hughes Colloquy, MELUS, and the forthcoming sestina anthology, Obsession.

Dana Gioia is a poet and critic. He has published four books of poetry, including Interrogations at Noon, which won the 2002 American Book Award, and Pity the Beautiful, as well as three collections of criticism, including Can Poetry Matter?, and two opera libretti.

Robin Becker’s seven collections of poems include Tiger Heron. Liberal Arts Research Professor of English at Penn State, she has received fellowships from the Bunting Institute at Harvard, the Mass Cultural Council, and the NEA.