Melissa Christine Goodrum moved to NYC to gain an M.F.A. in poetry from Brooklyn College. Her work can be found in The New York Quarterly, The Torch, The Tiny, Rhapsoidia, Can We Have Our Ball Back?, Transmission, Bowery Women: Poems, and A Harpy Flies Down by Other Rooms Press. She wears many, many masks—poet, translator, scholar, editor, photographer, and writing teacher in the New York City Public School system.

Michèle Voltaire Marcelin is a Haitian actress, painter, and writer who currently teaches in New York. She writes in three languages and her first novel, La Désenchantée, was published in 2006. She has performed extensively on stage and screen, and has presented her poetry in front of audiences at a wide array of clubs and universities. Her paintings have been exhibited throughout the United States and Haiti. Other published works of poetry and prose: Lost and Found , Amours et Bagatelles, and La Desencantada.

Chris Brandt is a writer and activist. Also a translator, carpenter, furniture designer, and theatre worker. He teaches poetry at Fordham University. He is proud to have been found guilty on May 29, 2008, of exercising free speech (sic) at the U.S. Supreme Court, and sentenced to ten days (suspended) and a year's probation. His poems and essays have been published in magazines, journals, and anthologies, including Off the Cuffs: Poetry by and About the Police (Soft Skull, edited by Jackie Sheeler); Lateral (Barcelona); El signo del gorrion (Valladolid); La Jornada (Mexico); Phatitude, Appearances; The Unbearables; National Poetry Magazine of the Lower East Side; Liqueur 44 (Paris) and Crimes of the Beats. His translations of Cuban fiction have been published in The New Yorker and many other places.

Jeanie Bogart is journalist, poet and fashion designer. She is presently, a staff writer and editor at two magazines: Connecticut Haitian Voice and CSMS Magazine. She was in 2006 the winner of her first international poetry contest in the creole language held by Kalbas Lò Lakarayib. She is the author of “Lettres d’Automne/Tanlapli” a CD released in Montreal by Éditions Paroles. In 2008 she published her first poetry book Un Jour... tes pantouffles with the Éditions Paroles. She published in November 2009 “Dènye Rèl”, an album (CD) of Haitian Creole poetry. She is currently working on her first novel. Her work has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies.

Obed Jean-Louis lives in New York City. He has won the hearts and interest of audiences throughout his young career as a classical guitarist and vocalist. Music has been a blanket and pillow throughout my travels; without it I would not be able to rest comfortably” says Obed. “His words invoke thoughts, his arrangements are compelling, his voice calms your worries and his spirit brings hope to a world of chaos.” Malachi Rivers.

Thomas C. Spear is Professor of French at Lehman College and the Graduate Center of CUNY.  His publications include a collection of short texts by 40 Haitian authors, Une journée haïtienne (Mémoire d'encrier/Présence Africaine, 2007), and La culture française vue d'ici et d'ailleurs, treize auteurs témoignent (Karthala, 2002), first-person essays about a love-hate relationship with France and French culture. His translations and co-translations include Leslie Kaplan's Brooklyn Bridge and Edouard Glissant's Faulkner, Mississippi. He publishes widely on contemporary French and francophone literature, specifically on forms of autobiography. He is the editor of the web site Île en île, a database featuring literature from French-speaking islands. "Le Scorpion," a chapter of his sidafiction, is forthcoming in l'Atelier d'écriture.