Heather C. Akerberg recently completed her MFA in Creative Writing at Brown University. Her work has appeared in Bombay Gin and untitled: a magazine of prose poetry.

Richard Anders, born in 1928 in East Prussia, has settled in Berlin after stints of teaching German in Athens and Zagreb. In the ’60s he worked as an archivist in Hamburg and made contact with the Paris surrealists. His books include: Zeck (1979), Verscherzte Trümpfe (1993), Hörig (1997) from which our collage is taken, Die Pendeluhren haben Ausgangssperre (1998), all from Galrev Verlag. In English: The Footprints of One Who Has Not Stepped Forth, translated by Andrew Joron (Black Square Editions, 2000).

Guy Bennett is the author of Last Words (1998), The Row (2000), and 100 Famous Views (2001). Recent translations include Michel Leiris’ Operratics (2001), and Mostafa Nissabouri’s Approach to the Desert Space (2001). He lives in Los Angeles, where he publishes Seeing Eye Books.

Macgregor Card lives in Brooklyn and has a chapbook, Souvenir Winner, forthcoming from Hophophop Press. He co-edits The Germ, and now Germ Folios and Germ Monographs.

Amy Catanzano’s poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in American Letters & Commentary, Columbia Poetry Review, Conjunctions, Web Conjunctions, and Facture. She received her MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and lives in Boulder, Colorado.

Carlfriedrich Claus was born in 1930 and died in the late 90s. He lived in East Berlin. Our images are taken from Denklandschaften, ifa, 1993.

Veronica Corpuz is the founder of PUB LUSH, a multimedia hub of visual and sound experiments.

Elfriede Czurda, born 1946, is an art historian and lives in Vienna and Berlin. Books of poetry include ein griff = eingriff inbegriffen (Rainer, 1978) and unGLÜXreflexe (Droschl, 1995), among her novels are Signora Julia (1985) and Die Giftmörderinnen (1991). Almost 1 Life was published in English as A.bacus #112 (1998; trans. R. Waldrop).

Michael Donhauser, born 1956, lives in Vienna. Among his books are Dich noch und (Residenz, 1991), Von den Dingen (Carl Hanser, 1993) and Sarganserland (Urs Engeler, 1998). Our texts are taken from Die Wörtlichkeit der Quitte (Droschl, 1990). He has also translated Rimbaud.

Brandon Downing’s booklets include Lazio and Dog and Horsey Pictures. His first collection, The Shirt Weapon, was published this January by Germ Monographs. He has just finished his second, Lake Antiquity, and he lives in New York City with all of them.

Patrick F. Durgin is the author of Pundits Scribes Pupils (Potes & Poets, 1998) and Sorter (Duration Press, 2001). Durgin’s work has appeared most recently in Chain, Crayon, and Lipstick Eleven. He lives in Buffalo, NY where he continues to edit and publish Kenning and Kenning Editions.

Kari Edwards is a poet, artist, and author of post/(pink) (2000). She is also the poetry editor for I.F.G.E.’s Transgender – Tapestry. Hir work can be found in Blood and Tears (2000), Bombay Gin, Van Gogh’s Ear, Belight Fiction, In Posse, and Facture.

Elke Erb lives in what used to be East Berlin. She has published ten volumes of poetry, most recently Mensch sein, nicht (1998) and Sachverstand (2000) from Urs Engeler Editor. Also a book of essays and many translations from the Russian (Zvetaeva, Achmatova, Chlebnikov, Essenin, Pushkin, etc.). In English: Mountains in Berlin: Selected Poems, trans. R. Waldrop (Burning Deck, 1995).

Gundi Feyrer was born in 1956, studied art in Munich and Hamburg. Our text is taken from Geheimnisse verändern sich (Kellner, 1989). More recently she has published a long prose, Der Himmel ist eine Flasche (Ritter, 1994).

Dieter Gräf, born 1960, lives in Köln. In 1999, he was a guest at the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles. His books are Rauschstudie: Vater & Sohn (Suhrkamp, 1994), Treibender Kopf (Suhrkamp, 1997), and Tussi-Recherche (2000) which combines texts with advertising images.

Jen Hofer divides her time between Mexico City and Los Angeles. She is currently editing and translating Houses Small and Defiant/Casas Pequeñas y Desafiantes, an anthology of contemporary poetry by Mexican women that will be co-published in 2003 by the University of Pittsburgh Press and Ediciones Sin Nombre. Her translations and poems can be found in recent or shortly forthcoming issues of Antennae, Conundrum, Kenning, Lipstick Eleven, PomPom, Provincetown Arts, and in issue #139 of A.BACUS, entitled Laws. Her first book of poems, Slide Rule, will be published by subpress early in 2002.

David Harrison horton is editor of the poetry journal Chase Park and teaches English at Patten College in Oakland, California. His work has recently appeared or is forthcoming in syllogism, Gestalten, Phoebe, The Oregon Review, and Fish Drum, among others. He lives and writes in Oakland.

Anett Jessop lives with her son Kasra in Davis, CA. Her art interests include Esperanto poetry, classical and contemporary Persian poetry, painting, and Flamenco music and dance.

Paul Foster johnson lives in New York City.

Andrew Joron is the author of several collections of poetry, including Science Fiction (Pantograph, 1992), The Removes (Hard Press, 1999), and Fathom (Black Square Editions, forthcoming). He has translated the German philosopher Ernst Bloch’s Literary Essays (Stanford University Press, 1998) and lives in Berkeley.

Catherine kasper has work forthcoming in Timothy McSweeney’s, The Denver Quarterly, and Charter Oak Review. She is an assistant professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

Birgit Kempker, born 1956, teaches in a “Word & Image” program in Basel. Recent books are Ich will ein Buch mit dir (Urs Engeler, 1997), Als ich das erste Mal mit einem Jungen im Bett lag (Droschl, 1998) and Mike und Jane (Droschl, 2001).

Amy King received a MacArthur Scholarship for Poetry in 1999, and has work in Riding the Meridian, Pavement Saw, and Filling Station. Her chapbook, The People Instruments, is forthcoming from Pavement Saw Press later this year. She lives in Brooklyn.

Barbara Köhler was born in 1959, studied literature in Leipzig and now lives in Duisburg. Our poems are taken from Blue Box (Suhrkamp, 1995). In 1999 she published a book of texts and installations, Wittgenstein’s Nichte (Suhrkamp, 1999).

John latta’s Wrst collection, Rubbing Torsos, appeared in 1979 (Ithaca House). Another, titled Breeze, will be published in 2002 by the University of Notre Dame Press. Recent poems are in or forthcoming from Bird Dog, The Germ, Black Warrior Review, Luna, Jacket, Cello Entry, Leviathan Quarterly, Verse, New American Writing, The Hat, Skanky Possum, and elsewhere.

)ohn Lowther edits 3rdness (press) and 108 (magazine) runs with the Atlanta Poets Group and is trying continually to fail better.

Jason Frederick lynn arrived with due warning on June 27th, 1963; he is only half as Irish as Frank O’Hara; some of his recent poems appear in Fence and Lit; despite his book in Danish, Lactations for the Dead, selling out, he has yet to be paid, or even receive a mail-order title of Viscount; currently he tries fecklessly to convince record companies that his poems set to the music of Hans Roedelius are a worthy investment. Mr. Lynn would like to be a movie star when he grows up.

Sarah Mangold’s first book, Household Mechanics, was chosen by C.D. Wright for the 2001 New Issues Poetry Prize. It will appear in March 2002 from New Issues Press. She currently lives in Seattle and edits Bird Dog.

Nick Moudry teaches at the University of Massachusetts. He is a founding editor of Braincase Press. Other recent sonnets can be found in Fence and Washington Square.

Sawako Nakayasu is the editor of !Factorial Press, which publishes collaborative writing, and the translation coordinator for HOW2. Recent work has appeared or is forthcoming in Chain, Conundrum, Kenning, 108, and New American Writing. Clutch, a chapbook of hockey love poems, is forthcoming from Tinfish Press.

Marcelin Pleynet, born in Lyon, France in 1933, is the author of nine poetry collections and more than a dozen works on art and culture. His tenure as literary editor of the journal Tel Quel from th 1960s–’80s brought him into contact (and conflict) with many key French literary figures. Provisoires amants des nègres, of which the poems presented here form a part, is Pleynet’s first collection of poetry, originally published in 1962 by Seuil and reprinted in Les Trois Livres in 1984 and again in 2000.

Stephen Ratcliffe’s latest book is Listening to Reading, a collection of essays on contemporary ‘experimental’ poetry published by SUNY Press. His recent books of poetry include Idea’s Mirror (Potes & Poets), Mallarme: Poems in Prose (Santa Barbara Review Press), and Sculpture (Littoral Books). He publishes Avenue B books and teaches at Mills College in Oakland.

Martha Ronk’s most recent work is the memoir, Displeasures of the Table (Green Integer). Her books include Eyetrouble (Georgia), State of Mind (Sun & Moon Press), and Why/Why Not is forthcoming from UC Press.

Standard Schaefer’s first book is Nova (Sun & Moon Press, 2001). He currently teaches poetry at Otis College of Art & Design. He is working on a book length poem tentatively titled Water & Power.

Waltraud Seidlhofer’s books include Fassadentexte (Edition neue Texte, 1976), Geometrie einer Landschaft (Edition Neue Texte, 1986), la(e)sergedichte (Blattwerk, 1996), ein erinnern (Blattwerk, 1999).

Kerri Sonnenberg lives in Chicago where she edits the poetry journal Conundrum. Recent work has appeared in New American Writing, The Columbia Poetry Review, Prosodia, Moria, and canwehaveourballback.

Bruno Steiger’s poems are taken from the magazine Zwischen den Zeilen (#6, 1995). He has also published essays and novels (Jackson Pollock in Amerika (Rowohlt, 1993)).

Ulf Stolterfoht was born 1963 in Stuttgart. Lives in Berlin. Fachsprachen I–IX (Urs Engeler, 1998) is his first book.

Cole Swensen’s most recent book is Such Rich Hour, based on a 15th-century illuminated manuscript. She is currently working on a series of poems about hands. She teaches at the University of Denver.

Mark Tardi has a deep affinity for twin primes, Chopin nocturnes, limeade, and the word “whilst.” He is a failure at making Jello.

Walter Thümler’s sequence is taken from the magazine Zwischen den Zeilen (#10, 1997). He has translated contemporary Russian and English poetry and edited an anthology of Modern Russian Poetry.

Hung Q. Tu is the author of A Great Ravine (Parenthesis) and Verisimilitude (Atelos). His most recent collection, Structures of Feeling, from which “Bananas or Brace Yourself” is culled, will be available from Krupskaya Books. He currently lives in San Diego.

Rosmarie Waldrop’s recent books are Reluctant Gravities (New Directions, 1999), Split Infinites (Singing Horse, 1998), and Another Language: Selected Poems (Talisman House, 1997). Northwestern has reprinted her novels, The Hanky of Pippin’s Daughter and A Form/of Taking/It All in one paperback. She has translated Elke Erb, Friederike Mayröcker, Oskar Pastior et al.