Ghassan Zaqtan is a Beit Jala-born novelist, editor, and the author of more than ten collections of poetry. His books have been translated into various languages. He was twice nominated for the Neustadt International Prize. Like a Straw Bird It Follows Me, the first book of his work to appear in English, received the Griffin International Poetry Prize in 2013. He lives in Ramallah.

Fady Joudah is a practicing physician and the author of three collections of poetry and several volumes of poetry in translation from the Arabic. His debut poetry book won the Yale Series of Younger Poets competition, and he has received a Guggenheim Fellowship as well as several awards for translation. He lives in Houston.

Books by Ghassan Zaqtan:

Other poems on the web by Ghassan Zaqtan (translated by Fady Joudah):
"A Picture of the House at Beit Jala"
"Alone and the river before me"
Two poems
"Glee"
"Old Reasons"
Four poems
"Handkerchief"
Four poems
"Damascus 1986"

Ghassan Zaqtan According to Wikipedia.