2018 Bill Holm Winner, Jayne Marek
The titles of Jayne’s pieces are “Snow Day,” “Hungry,” “The Balance,” “Winter Pond as Window,” “Worry,” and “Woodcock Walk.” Since I lived for over 30 years in the upper Midwest, I have written a number of poems about that distinct ecology and climate, especially about the cold months. This set reflects the chilly joys of walking and watching birds in winter, for instance in Indiana, a flyway for cranes and a place where one can encounter woodcocks making their invisible, eerie-sounding displays.
Bio Note: Jayne Marek’s poetry and art photos appear recently in One, Stirring, Ascent, Slipstream, Bangor Literary Journal, The Cortland Review, Gulf Stream, Raven Chronicles, Women’s Studies Quarterly, Grub Street, and Amsterdam Quarterly. Twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize, she also was a finalist for the David Martinson–Meadowhawk Prize, the Naugatuck River Review narrative poetry contest, the Ex Ophidia Poetry Book Prize, and the Ryan R. Gibbs Photography Contest. Her most recent books are In and Out of Rough Water (Aldrich Press, 2017) and The Tree Surgeon Dreams of Bowling (Finishing Line, 2018).
Bio Note: Jayne Marek’s poetry and art photos appear recently in One, Stirring, Ascent, Slipstream, Bangor Literary Journal, The Cortland Review, Gulf Stream, Raven Chronicles, Women’s Studies Quarterly, Grub Street, and Amsterdam Quarterly. Twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize, she also was a finalist for the David Martinson–Meadowhawk Prize, the Naugatuck River Review narrative poetry contest, the Ex Ophidia Poetry Book Prize, and the Ryan R. Gibbs Photography Contest. Her most recent books are In and Out of Rough Water (Aldrich Press, 2017) and The Tree Surgeon Dreams of Bowling (Finishing Line, 2018).
Jayne’s Bill Holm Witness poetry collection to be published in WRUP Blog.
Carla Gober-Park, of Redlands, CA, is the winner of the 2017 Prairie Poetry Prize Prairie Sampler contest with her beautiful submission “Prairie Poetry- Prairie Grasses.” Congratulations! Carla works as a professor and administrator at Loma Linda University in Southern California. Much of her writing focuses on nature and health, whether health of the land, people, relationships, or societies. She teaches whole person care to medical students and speaks to audiences throughout the world on a variety of topics related to wholeness and health. She lives with her Scottish husband, Gordon, and Weimaraner dog Cypher, in Redlands, CA.
Alice D’ Allesio is the winner of the 2017 Paul Gruchow Contest for her essay “Tending the Valley.” Congrats Alice. She is a Middleton poet whose poems often reflect the wonder of the natural world, and/or the environmentalist’s vision. Social/political commentary and family/love relationships are also favorite subjects, rendered with a serious or light touch. Her poems have been published in the Wisconsin Academy Review, Earth’s Daughters, North Coast Review, Ariel, Free Press, The Kerf, Fox Cry Review, Verse Wisconsin, and others. They have won awards from The Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets and Wisconsin Regional Writers, and she was a runner-up in the Wisconsin Academy Review Poetry Contest in 2002.
Taylor is an essayist living in Ames, Iowa. His work has appeared in Orion, the Northern Plains Ethics Journal, High Country News, The Huffington Post, among others. His chapbook of poems, Ruin: Elegies from the Bakken, is published by Red Bird Chapbooks, and he is currently editing the country’s first anthology of creative writing about fracking, Fracture: Essays, Poems, and Stories on Fracking in America, through Ice Cube Press.
Katharyn Howd Machan, Professor of Writing at Ithaca College, holds degrees from the College of Saint Rose, the University of Iowa, and Northwestern University. Her poems have appeared in numerous magazines; in anthologies and textbooks such as The Bedford Introduction to Literature, The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2013, Poetry: An Introduction, Early Ripening: American Women’s Poetry Now, Sound and Sense, Writing Poems, Literature: Reading and Writing the Human Experience; and in 32 collections, most recently Wild Grapes: Poems of Fox (Finishing Line Press, 2014), H (Gribble Press, 2014—national winner) and When She’s Asked to Think of Colors (Palettes & Quills Press, 2009—national winner). Former director of the national Feminist Women’s Writing Workshops, Inc., in 2012 she edited Adrienne Rich: A Tribute Anthology (Split Oak Press).
Jeanine Stevens studied poetry in the Creative Writing Program at U.C. Davis and has an MA in Anthropology. She is the recipient of the MacGuffin Poet Hunt, and a finalist for the William Stafford Award. She has other first place awards from Ekphrasis, The Bay Area Poet’s Coalition and Mendocino Coast Writer’s Conference. Her work has appeared in Evansville Review, Poet Lore, North Dakota Review, Pearl, Sentinel Quarterly, Bardsong, and Cider Press Review. She is the author of Sailing on Milkweed, Cherry Grove Collections. Her latest chapbook, Needle in the Sea, was published by Tiger’s Eye Press. Besides writing, Jeanine enjoys collage, Tai Chi, Romanian folk dance, and hiking in the Sierras. She was raised in Indiana and now lives in Sacramento and Lake Tahoe with her husband, photographer Greg Czalpinski.
Joan Mazza has worked as a medical microbiologist, psychotherapist, seminar leader, and has been a Pushcart Prize nominee. Author of six books, including Dreaming Your Real Self (Penguin/Putnam), her poetry has appeared in Rattle, Off the Coast, Kestrel, Slipstream, American Journal of Nursing, The MacGuffin, Mezzo Cammin, Buddhist Poetry Review, and The Nation. She ran away from the hurricanes of South Florida to be surprised by the earthquakes and tornadoes of rural central Virginia, where she writes poetry and does fabric and paper art. You can find out more about Joan at 
Jan Pettit’s poetry has appeared (or will soon appear) in The National Poetry Review, Water-Stone Review, Great River Review, South Dakota Review, Rosebud Magazine, Tusculum Review, Natural Bridge, and in Nebraska Presence, an anthology of poetry by native Nebraskans. Her nonfiction work was recently featured on the MnArtists.org audio segment, You Are Hear. Jan is a graduate of the MFA Program at Hamline University. By day, she writes advertising copy. By night, she writes poetry and prose. She is married to jazz guitarist, Paul Renz and is the mother of two beautiful almost-men. Jan is one of the co-winners of Variations in Winter: Bill Holm Poetry Contest with her collection “Lapses of Snow.”