Ron Padgett's contribution to American poetry is HUGE. Originally from Tulsa, where he edited The White Dove Review with Joe Brainard, publishing Creeley, Kerouac, Leroi Jones and others, he moved to New York in 1960 with a cadre that included Ted Berrigan, Brainard, and Dick Gallup. Together they invented, via the inspiration of poets such as Ashbery & O'Hara, what has become known as The New York School. He studied with Kenneth Koch and Lionel Trilling at Columbia. He directed The Poetry Project in the late seventies and publications at Teachers & Writers from 1980 to 2000. Padgett's books of poetry include You Never Know (Coffeehouse Press, 2002), Poems I Guess I Wrote (2001), New & Selected Poems (1995), The Big Something (1990), Triangles in the Afternoon (1979), and Great Balls of Fire (1969). His first collection of poems, Bean Spasms, written with Ted Berrigan, was published in 1967. He has also published a volume of selected prose titled Blood Work (1993), as well as translations of Blaise Cendrars' Complete Poems (1992), Pierre Cabanne's Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp (1971), and Apollinaire's The Poet Assassinated (1968). His most recent book is a memoir--Oklahoma Tough: My Father, King of the Tulsa Bootleggers.

Amy King is the author of Antidotes for an Alibi published in 2005 by BlazeVox.  She teaches English at Nassau Community College on Long Island and has been writing poems throughout her numerous careers, which have included working for the Department of Defense, managing a popular fast food restaurant, multi-tasking as a medical technician in Labor & Delivery, serving as a residence counselor and advocate for the learning disabled, directing an ESL school in Manhattan and many other positions better left a mystery.

Bridge Street Books is located 5 blocks from Foggy Bottom Metro, next to Four Seasons in Georgetown at the end of M street

In business for over twenty years, Bridge Street is one of a rare breed these days--a successful independent bookseller. It has what is certainly the best poetry section in Washington, well-stocked in alternative poetry and poetics as well as mainstream. Bridge Street also has extremely good selections in Philosophy, Politics, Cultural Theory, Women's Studies, Film, Music, and other areas. They also have a plethora of quality sale books.

Manager (& well-known poet!) Rod Smith has been organizing readings in the Washington Area since 1988 and has brought Rae Armantrout, Charles Bernstein, Lee Ann Brown, John Cage, Kevin Davies, Lyn Hejinian, Lisa Jarnot, Alice Notley, Tom Raworth, Lisa Robertson, Leslie Scalapino, Chris Stroffolino and many other important writers to DC.