Jason Morphew started life in a mobile home in Pike County, Arkansas; at UCLA he's completing his Ph.D dissertation, “Hamlet's Petrarchism.” He's published the poetry collection In Order to Commit Suicide, he's been interviewed about it in Quarterly West, and he read alongside Claudia Rankine and Afaa Michael Weaver at the 2014 Kingsley Tufts Award ceremony. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Gigantic, Foothill, Anamesa, Juxtaprose, Storm Cellar, Third Wednesday, and Juked; he’s been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. As a singer-songwriter he's released albums on the labels Brassland, Ba Da Bing!, Max, and Unread.