Jan Bay-Petersen is a New Zealander who grew up in a small town beside an estuary. Many of her poems reflect her love of coastlands and the sea. She went to university in New Zealand, then dropped out and travelled round having a look at the world, working in a variety of jobs including nurse aid and newspaper vendor. After a few years she settled down, came to Cambridge to do a Ph.D., and worked in Taiwan for twenty years in an agricultural centre serving farmers on very small farms. She is married and lives in Cambridge, where she is a member of the local Stanza group and Cambridge Writers. She won the 2013 Poetry Society Stanza Poetry Competition, and has had poems published in The Rialto, The North, The Interpreter’s House and other magazines.