.J. Sandella is the author of WAYS TO BEG (Black Lawrence Press, 2021), which was a finalist or semi-finalist for several awards, including the Miller Williams Poetry Prize, the Brittingham & Felix Pollak Prizes, and the Crab Orchard First Book Award. Selected by Dorianne Laux for inclusion in the Best New Poets anthology, he is the recipient of an Elinor Benedict Prize for Poetry (selected by Aimee Nezhukumatathil), a William Matthews Poetry Prize (selected by Billy Collins), two Academy of American Poets Prizes, and two pushcart prize nominations. Poems can be found in Poet Lore, New Ohio Review, Hotel Amerika, Poetry Northwest, The Chattahoochee Review, and The South Carolina Review, among others. He lives in Cleveland, Ohio.