Before the Forest Burns: Poems & Translations

Born in Los Angeles, California, Leslie Monsour was raised in Mexico City, Chicago, and Panama. She is the author of The Alarming Beauty of the Sky (Red Hen Press, 2005), The Colosseum Critical Introduction to Rhina P. Espaillat (Franciscan University Press, 2021), and several chapbooks, including The House Sitter (Finishing Line Press, 2011), winner of the 2010 Finishing Line Press Open Chapbook Competition. Her poems, essays, and translations appear in such journals as Able Muse, Alabama Literary Review, The Dark Horse, First Things, Galway Review, Literary Matters, Light, Los Angeles Review of Books, Mezzo Cammin, and Poetry, as well as numerous anthologies ranging from California Poetry from the Gold Rush to the Present to Outer Space: 100 Poems. Her work has been featured several times on Garrison Keillor’s NPR program, The Writer’s Almanac, as well as Poet Laureate Ted Kooser’s syndicated column American Life in Poetry. The recipient of five Pushcart Prize nominations and an NEA