Alan S. Bridges began writing haiku in 2008 after meeting acclaimed poet John Stevenson, editor of The Heron’s Nest, on a cross-country train trip. Since then, Alan’s haiku have been widely published and he has received a number of awards, including first place in the Ito en Oi Ocha contest, Robert Spiess Memorial Haiku Competition (twice), Peggy Willis Lyles Haiku Awards, Irish Haiku Society International Competition and Kaji Aso Studio International Haiku Contest. He was twice voted poet-of-the-year by readers of The Heron’s Nest. Alan’s haiku collections include In a Flash (Snapshot Press, 2019), Stirring Ashes (Turtle Light Press, 2020) and In the Curves (Red Moon Press, 2020). He enjoys golfing, skiing, cooking, fishing and hunting for arrowheads and mushrooms. Alan currently resides in Westford, Massachusetts.

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Jacquie Pearce is a children’s book author and poet from Vancouver, Canada. She is editor of Last Train Home, an international anthology of train-themed haiku, tanka, and rengay, which won the Haiku Society of America Merit Award for best haiku anthology in 2022. Jacquie and Alan have been writing rengay together (from opposite sides of North America) for seven years and are past co-editors of linked verse for Frogpond: the Journal of the Haiku Society of America. Jacquie was also co-judge of the Haiku Society of America’s Garry Gay rengay contest in 2021.