Kristiana Colón is an adjunct English professor at Tribeca Flashpoint Academy and Malcolm X College in Chicago, as well as an experienced poet, performer, and burgeoning playwright. She is proud to see her work anthologized in Dzanc Books' Best of the Web 2010 and Haven Books' Not a Muse collection. Other recent publications include hinchas de poesia, Our Stories, chickenpinata, among several other online and print journals. Her short plays have recently appeared in American Theater Company's The Silver Project, in Teatro Luna's 10 x 10 Festival in conjunction with the Goodman's Latino Theater Festival, Dramatist Personae's Artist Gumbo series and  Simple Theater's K.I.S.S. festival. Her most recent full-length project one week in spring was a finalist for Victory Gardens' Ignition festival and had its first full staged reading in TL's Lunadasseries in October 2010. Her first play but i cd only whisper was the 2nd place winner of the Theodore Ward Playwriting contest in 2008, and her play the darkest pit had its world premiere at the Prop Thtr in 2009. She is an MFA graduate from the School of the Art Institute and has been seen on HBO's Def Poetry Jam. More information about Kristiana, as well as text, audio, and video samples of her work, can be found at www.kristianacolon.com.

Aricka Foreman is a Cave Canem fellow whose work has appeared in The Drunken Boat, TORCH: A Journal for African American Women, Union Station Magazine, and Bestiary Magazine. Obsessed with love as mythology, how language shapes identity, morality and its overlap in sexuality, mental illness, and social constructs, her writing strives to interrogate these worlds and her fractal experience in them. She lives in Detroit and teaches poetry in public schools as a writer-in-residence through the InsideOut Literary Arts Project.

Lauren Herrmann is an independent photographer, musician, and writer. She is currently the visual director at Lethal Poetry. She recently acquired a BFA in Photography from UIC. Her photography has appeared in over a dozen local art exhibits, including a solo show at New Works Gallery featuring her documentary work from Nepal during its revolution in 2008. Lauren currently lives at the Lethal Poetry Residence in Chicago. 

Debra Kayes lives in Chicago, where she spends her time teaching art and design classes at Columbia College, doing freelance graphic design, and working on an assortment of mixed media studio projects. See her work at debrakayes.com.

Writer/performer/humorist, J.W. Basilo, is equal parts poignant and perverse, hilarious and heart-wrenching. His raucous performances and uncanny charisma have earned him a reputation as one of the most sought-after and compelling spoken word artists working today. His work has appeared on NPR, in the Chicago Tribune, and in hundreds of theaters, dive bars, schools and comedy clubs across North America. His one man dramedy, No One Can Fix You, debuted in 2009 to rave reviews in Chicago, Seattle, and New York City. As a competitor, Basilo was a finalist at the 2007 Individual World Poetry Slam, finished 2nd at the 2009 National Underground Poetry Individual Championship, and has represented Chicago at the National Poetry Slam four times. To date, he has released two full-length albums, Poet Laureate of Apt. 2E (2006) and Love Crimes, Etc. (2007), as well as the chapbook I Dare You to Believe This. Currently, he is a Writer in Residence at Chicago's Real Talk Ave. All things considered, he’s doing pretty well for a guy who failed Creative Writing in high school. His artful jackassery can be found at his internet home, BustedMouth.com.

Zoelle Egner is a Chicago based poet, performer and corporate sell out. She also serves as a Marketing Coordinator for Chicago Slam Works Her work has appeared in various journals including Danse Macabre and Plankton. She is probably more octopus than person. She is also probably taller than you.

Kaylee Pope is currently residing in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She's unemployed and working on writing for both work and for play. She has a degree in Anthropology and English from Albion College. An alumni of two AmeriCorps programs, she spent the last year working at an after-school program helping with intervention tutoring, creating projects, and making a lot of Lego monsters. Within the next few years, she hopes to work in the publishing field and continue writing. You can reach Kaylee at her website: www.pkaylee.com.

Katharine Van de Putte was born and raised in the suburbs of Detroit, Michigan. She received her BA in English with Creative Writing from Albion College in Albion, Michigan. There, she wrote a collection of poetry on her experiences in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina. She resides in Royal Oak, Michigan, most of the time. She currently is lazing in a hammock in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.