Ross Gay was born in Youngstown, Ohio, and grew up just outside of Philadelphia. He is the author of two books of poems, Against Which (CavanKerry Press 2006) and Bringing the Shovel Down (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011), and he is co-author, with Aimee Nezhukumatathil, of the chapbook Two Gardens. His poems and essays have appeared in American Poetry Review,Gulf Coast, Massachusetts Review, and The Sun, among other magazines and anthologies. He is also the co-author, with the painter Kimberly Thomas, of the artists’ books The Halo, BRN2HNT, and The Bullet. Ross is an editor with the chapbook press, Q Avenue, which has published early work by Matthew Dickman, Simone White, Chris Mattingly, and Layli Long Soldier. He has been a Cave Canem fellow and a Bread Loaf tuition scholar. Ross is also a founding member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a publicly owned, volunteer-run, free-fruit-for-all, organic orchard, where he serves as the co-chair of the education team. In this capacity he teaches or co-teaches ten classes a year on various aspects of orcharding, from pruning to propagation. Ross is currently at work on a non-fiction book about African American farming, in addition to his poetry projects. Ross is an associate professor in the M.F.A. program at Indiana University and in Drew University’s Low-Residency M.F.A. program. He is the recipient of a 2013 Guggenheim Fellowship.