A native of Minnesota, Francine Sterle (pronounced STER lee) holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in poetry from Warren Wilson College and has studied writing in a variety of academic and workshop settings, including Oxford University, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Spoleto Writers’ Workshop, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, and the Squaw Valley Community of Writers.  She is the author of Nude in Winter (Tupelo Press, 2006), Every Bird is One Bird (Editor’s Prize, Tupelo Press, 2001), as well as The White Bridge (Poetry Harbor, 1999), and is a recipient of a Loft-McKnight Foundation Award, a Jerome Foundation Travel and Study Grant, residency fellowships from the Anderson Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, the Leighton Studios at the Banff Centre for the Arts and the Blacklock Nature Sanctuary as well as both a Fellowship Grant and a Career Opportunity Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board.  Her poems have appeared in a variety of literary journals, including The North American Review, Nimrod, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Atlanta Review, and have been anthologized in 33 Minnesota Poets and The Cancer Poetry Project.  She works as a poetry mentor, teaches in both academic and community settings, and lives on the West Two River with her husband, Jonathan Speare, a clinical psychologist, two Maine Coon cats and an exuberant Rhodesian Ridgeback.