Patrick Sylvain was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and emigrated to Massachusetts in 1981. He works as a bilingual public schoolteacher in Cambridge, while pursuing an M.A. in Education and American Civilization. Sylvain, who is a member of the Dark Room Collective, has published work in African American Review, Agni, American Poetry Anthology, Haiti Progress, Moody Street Review, Muleteeth, Prisma, and In the Tradition: An Anthology of Young Black Writers.