Eco-Literature, Persistence, Resistance

Alison Swan’s fifth book, A Fine Canopy (Wayne State University Press), was named one of the eleven most anticipated poetry releases of fall 2020 by Literary Hub and was a bestseller at Literati Bookstore. Her first book, Fresh Water: Women Writing on the Great Lakes, is a Michigan Notable Book. Numerous literary journals and anthologies have published her poems and environmental writing, including the eco-justice poetry anthology Ghost Fishing, edited by Melissa Tuckey. Alison has been awarded a Mesa Refuge Residency for her environmentally conscious writing and the Michigan Environmental Council’s Petoskey Prize for Grassroots Environmental Leadership. She is as concerned about the biodiversity crisis as the climate crisis. You can find her online at:  http://alisonswan.net.  

Poet and writer Keith Taylor recently retired from the University of Michigan where he taught in the undergraduate and graduate programs in creative writing. Recent publication: January 2021, Let Them Be Left, poems from Isle Royale published by Alice Greene & Co. His sixteenth collection, The Bird-while, was published by Wayne State University Press February 2017. Ecstatic Destinations was published by Alice Greene & Co in 2018. Keith's work has appeared in such publications as Story, The Los Angeles Times, Alternative Press, The Southern Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Notre Dame Review, The Iowa Review, Witness, Chicago Tribune, and Hanging Loose. Other books are Marginalia for a Natural History published by Black Lawrence Press, and Ghost Writers, a collection of ghost stories co-edited with Laura Kasischke, published by Wayne State University Press.