Martha Silano is the author of four books of poetry, including Reckless Lovely and The Little Office of the Immaculate Conception, both from Saturnalia Books. She also co-edited, with Kelli Russell Agodon, The Daily Poet: Day-By-Day Prompts for your Writing Practice. Her work has appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, and New England Review, among others. Saturnalia Books will release her fifth collection, Gravity Assist, in early 2019. Martha teaches at Bellevue College.

Martha Silano (1962-2025) was the author of six poetry collections: Terminal Surreal (Acre Books, September, 2025), about her journey with ALS; Last Train to Paradise: New and Selected Poems (Saturnalia Books, October, 2025); This One We Call Ours (Lynx House Press, 2024), winner of the 2023 Blue Lynx Prize; Gravity Assist (Saturnalia Books, 2019); Reckless Lovely (Saturnalia Books, 2014); and The Little Office of the Immaculate Conception (Saturnalia Books, 2011). She was coauthor of The Daily Poet: Day-by-Day Prompts for Your Writing Practice. Her awards included North American Review’s James Hearst Poetry Prize and The Cincinnati Review’s Robert and Adele Schiff Award. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, The Paris Review, American Poetry Review, Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review, and many anthologies. Diagnosed with ALS in 2023, she lived in Seattle, Washington, until May 2025.​