Rigoberto González is the author of 17 books of poetry and prose. His awards include the PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry, the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets, the Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, a Lambda Literary Award, the Poetry Center Book Award, and Guggenheim, National Endowment for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, and USA Rolón fellowships. He is currently director of the MFA program in Creative Writing at Rutgers-Newark, the State University of New Jersey. (Photo credit: Rigoberto González)