Alpay Ulku’s first collection is Meteorology (BOA Editions), which was selected as an “Notable Debut” by the Academy of American Poets book club.
His poems have appeared in literary journals such as AGNI, The American Poetry Review, the Antioch Review, Boulevard, Crazyhorse, Epoch, The Fiddlehead, Field, The Gettysburg Review, The Malahat Review, The Northwest Review, Ploughshares, Poetry Northwest, and Witness, among others. His work has been anthologized in American Poetry: The Next Generation; Poetry Daily; and City of the Big Shoulders: an Anthology of Chicago Poetry. His poem “Three Rivers” was selected by senior Slate editor Michael Agger for their “Best Valentine’s Day poems” feature, and his poem “The Stiller of Atoms” was selected by the Penn Center for the Book Public Poetry Project to be made into a poster and distributed to schools and libraries throughout Pennsylvania.
Alpay has received grants from the Illinois Arts Council, the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, the Iowa Arts Council, and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation.
Alpay received an MFA from the University of Iowa’s Writer’s Workshop and a BA from the Johnston Center for Integrative Studies at the University of Redlands.
Alpay lives with his wife, the writer Anne-Marie Ulku, in the city of Samsun on the Turkish Black Sea coast.