Mieczysław Jastrun was born Mojsze Agatstein in 1903 in Korolowka, Austria-Hungary (now Ukraine), and died in 1983 in Warsaw, Poland. A lyric poet and essayist of Jewish origin, he survived the terrible years of the Nazi occupation in Poland, and published a dozen volumes of poetry during his lifetime, including A Human Matter, A Meeting in Time, Protected Hour, and Memorials. He concerned himself most often with subjects of philosophy and morality and shunned Jewish themes in his poetry (with the exception of a few poems). However, as a poet who published his poems in resistance periodicals, he couldn't turn his back on the horrors of the genocide, nor was he able to escape historical necessity and despair in even his most mystical writings. Jastrun is considered to be one of the most important Polish poets of the years between the two world wars. He translated French, Russian, and German poets (including Rilke) into Polish. His work is included in Postwar Polish Poetry: An Anthology, edited by Czesław Miłosz.
Dzvinia Orlowsky is a founding editor of Four Way Books, a Pushcart Prize recipient, and the author of five poetry collections, including Convertible Night, Flurry of Stones (co-winner of the 2010 Sheila Motton Book Award), and Silvertone (2013). Her first collection, A Handful of Bees, was reprinted as a Carnegie Mellon University Contemporary Classic in 2008. Dzvinia's poetry and translations have appeared in numerous anthologies, including A Map of Hope: An International Literary Anthology, From Three Worlds: New Writing from the Ukraine, and A Hundred Years of Youth: A Bilingual Anthology of 20th Century Ukrainian Poetry. Her translation (from the Ukrainian) of Alexander Dovzhenko's novella, The Enchanted Desna, was published by House Between Water Press in 2006. She is a founding faculty member of the Solstice Low-Residency M.F.A. in Creative Writing Program of Pine Manor College and a special lecturer of poetry and prose-poetry at Providence College.
Jeff Friedman is a poet and translator. His sixth collection of poetry, Pretenders, was published by Carnegie Mellon University Press in 2014. His poems, mini stories, and translations have appeared in many literary magazines, including American Poetry Review, Poetry, New England Review, Poetry International, Quick Fiction, Antioch Review, AGNI Online, 100-Word Story, Sentence, Prairie Schooner, Vestal Review, Plume, and The New Republic. His work was recently included in The Bloomsbury Anthology of Contemporary Jewish American Poetry and Flash Fiction Funny. Jeff Friedman and Dzvinia Orlowsky's translation of Polish poet Mieczyslaw Jastrun's Memorials will be published by Lavender Ink/Dialogos in 2014. A contributing editor to Natural Bridge and Anthem Journal, he lives in West Lebanon, New Hamphshire, with the artist Colleen Randall and their dog Bekka.
