Ayako Matsushita grew up in Hachioji City, Tokyo and earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Hollins University. Her poems and tanka have been published in The Doctor T. J. Eckleburg Review, Iodine Poetry Journal, and the book Heisei Manyo-syu. She was also included in Best New Poets 2011. Her grandmother, Ikuko Matsushita is originally from Nagasaki, but was in Kobe at the time the A-bomb was dropped. Ikuko and her family survived the series of Kobe Air Raids in March 1945. Her experiences inspire Ayako to write poems and essays on WWII. Ayako currently lives in Tokyo, Japan.
