JEANANN VERLEE is a poet, editor, and former punk rocker who collects tattoos, polka dots, and vegetarian boots. Her first book, Racing Hummingbirds, earned the Independent Publisher Book Award Silver Medal in poetry and she is winner of both the Third Coast Poetry Prize and the Sandy Crimmins National Prize for Poetry. Verlee performs and facilitates workshops at schools, theatres, libraries, bookstores, dive bars and poetry venues across North America. She is an animal rights activist, feminist, and advocate for encouraging voice in the voiceless. jeanannverlee.com.