Poet Claudia Rankine at Cuyahoga County Public Library

Claudia Rankine will visit the Parma Snow Branch of Cuyahoga County Public Library on January 23 at 7pm.
(2121 Snow Road, Parma, OH  44134)

The event is FREE but registration is required.  Register here.

Claudia Rankine is the author of Citizen: An American Lyric and four previous books, including Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric. A provocative meditation on race, Citizen recounts mounting racial aggressions in ongoing encounters in twenty-first-century daily life and in the media. The book was a finalist for the 2014 National Book Award in Poetry and the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism and has won the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry, the NAACP Image Award, L.A. Times Book Prize and PEN Open Book Award.

Rankine is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, the winner of the 2014 Jackson Poetry Prize, and a contributing editor of Poets & Writers. She is also the Frederick Iseman Professor of Poetry at Yale University.

Rankine will be joined at this event by Ohio Poet Laureate, Dave Lucas. Born and raised in Cleveland, Lucas earned his B.A. (English) at John Carroll University, M.F.A. (Creative Writing) at the University of Virginia, and M.A. and Ph.D. (English Language and Literature) at the University of Michigan. His first book of poems, Weather, received the 2012 Ohioana Book Award for Poetry. He has been awarded a Creative Workforce Fellowship from the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture and a 2016 Cleveland Arts Prize. 

Books will be available for purchase and signing courtesy of Mac's Backs - Books on Coventry.

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This event is part of the NEA Big Read and is presented in partnership with The Baker-Nord Center for the Humanities at Case Western Reserve University and The Center for Arts-Inspired Learning.

This program is made possible, in part, by Ohio Humanities, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Looking back at Poetry in 2018

Michael Dirda, discussing the Best American Poetry 2018 volume, says that the theme that most characterizes American poetry is "American poetry’s reverence for genuineness, for authenticity":

• How do you define authenticity? A poetry collection explores a modern problem

In the introductory essay, Dana Gioia points out an odd statistic: for years, surveys show that youngest group of adults (ages 18–24) read more poetry than any other segment, and poetry reading is increasing, not decreasing.  He suggests that a huge cultural shift has occurred with literary performance and digital media. Technology has allowed poetry to reconnect with its auditory origins:

"The chief way American poets now reach their audience is through readings, either live or transmitted by radio, television, and internet... Print now coexists with other equally powerful media for poetry."

and Tracy K. Smith, in the New York Times, proclaims "political poetry is hot again".

(but I still hate political poetry*).

"We Need Writers Now More Than Ever..."

"Authoritative lying debases the truth. The resulting confusion of fantasy and reality is the definition of psychosis, a perilously vulnerable mental state.

     "...By writing and reading, we remind ourselves of the value of empathy, subtlety and contradiction. Literature is an antidote to the blunt distortions—good vs. evil, us vs. them—that are so easily exploited by those who would manipulate us."

--"We Need Writers Now More Than Ever. Our Democracy Depends On It," Jennifer Egan, Time

Another Season of The City

With the turn of the weather toward coolness, and the approach of the holiday season like a freight train loaded with turkey and tinsel, it's another season of The City poetry, Kathy Smith's electronic zine of poetry and art:

• The City, August 2018

"Bloom", by JJ Stick

Mark Kuhar celebrates d.a. levy

Collage by d.a levy. "Agent from Vega H.S." , collage by d.a. levy 1967, Cleveland, Ohio" handwiitten by levy verso. The collage was used in levy's underground newspaper The Buddhist Third Class Junkmail Oracle.

On the 50th anniversary of d.a. levy's death, Mark Kuhar celebrates the man and his legend:

• 50 years after d.a. levy’s death, the legend of Cleveland’s visionary poet and provocateur lives on

Dave Lucas: Poetry for People who hate Poetry

The new Poet Laureate of Ohio, Dave Lucas, has been appearing one week every month in Scene Magazine, with "Poetry for People Who Hate Poetry."
You can find it here:

• No. 1 (Sept.)
• No. 2 (Oct.)
• No. 3 (Nov.)

Or, read it at the Ohio Arts Council site: 1 2 3.

--He'll be reading in Arkon on November 21 at Latitudes Poetry Night (which happens the third Wednesday of each month, Compass Coffee, 647 East Market Street, Akron).

Come Write in Appletree Books’ Windows! (Plus Contests!)

Have you ever thought about writing in the windows of an independent bookstore?

For a third year, Appletree Books  invites Cleveland-area writers of all ages, formats, and genres to come write in our store windows this November in celebration of National Novel Writing Month!

You do not need be a novelist.  Whatever you write, whether you write for love or money or a grade or the glory of winning NaNoWriMo, we want you to come write with us!  Bring the tools of your trade; we’ll provide you a small table, a chair, and an electrical outlet in our store windows. Pick up your pen (actual or metaphorical), take a seat in our independent bookstore, a fixture in the Cedar-Fairmount district since 1975, and let your view of our vibrant neighborhood inspire you.  Sign up at https://tinyurl.com/yawkke8n.  For questions or more information, contact Jane Rothstein at jane@appletree-books.com.

2018 Writer in the Window Sign-Up tinyurl.com Welcome to Appletree Books' 2018 Writer in the Window event sign-up! In celebration of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in November, we are, for a third year, inviting Cleveland-area writers of all ages and all genres (you need not be writing a novel) to spend some time writing in our front windows. Sign up below for Writing in the Window 2018, and our NaNoWriMo coordinator will get back to you ASAP. **Please note: writers under age 12 must be accompanied by an adult. Writers under 12 should have a parent or guardian complete this form and indicate arrangements for adult supervision in the "Requests" area below. Thank you! **Note the second: I try to respond to sign-ups within a day, but that is not always possible. Please be patient. If not, I can be reached at jane@appletree-books.com. (Personal information will not be shared.)

Appletree Books Writing Contests

For the first time, Appletree is sponsoring two writing contests in conjunction with our month-long Writer in the Window program this November.  1) Student writers in elementary, middle, or high school are invited to submit a short work, no more than one page, in whatever format they wish.  2) In conjunction with Heights Arts’ Heights Writes Committee, we invite adults writing poetry to submit 1-3 poems that speak to the part that books and reading play in our lives.  Contestants in both contests must be signed up to be Writers in the Window at Appletree, and they are encouraged to write at least part of their entries in our windows. Entries are due no later than midnight, Saturday, December 1, 2018. Winners will be announced on December 10 and will be invited to read their work at a celebratory reception at Appletree Books on Friday, December 14. Multiple prizes, including Appletree gift certificates, will be awarded in each contest.  Sign up to be a Writer in the Window at https://tinyurl.com/yawkke8n.  For questions or more information, contact Jane Rothstein at jane@appletree-books.com.

Appletree Books
12419 Cedar Road
Cleveland Heights, OH 44106
(216) 791-2665

OCFB Interviews Poet and Journalist Lee Chilcote

This month the Cleveland Public Library's Ohio Center for the Book interviews Literary Cleveland's own Lee Chilcote:

• OCFB Interviews: Poet and Journalist Lee Chilcote

Wick announces their poetry season

The Wick Poetry Center at Kent State University has announced their slate of events, readings, exhibits, and a creativity festival, starting this Thursday (!) with a poetry reading at the Akron Art Museum.

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Wick Poetry Center Reading Series 2018-2019

We are excited to share this years' reading series with you below. Join us for a full slate of readings and events starting this week at the Akron Art Museum. From the Stan and Tom Wick Poetry Prize Reading honoring Michael McKee Green's new book with contest judge Khaled Mattawa to Celebrating Our Own and our 17th Annual Giving Voice, we hope you'll join us this year. To open, we are inviting you to attend the first event of the Series: Poetry Reading at the Akron Art Museum this Thursday, September 13, at 6 pm.

POETRY READING WITH URBAN VISION STUDENTS AT THE AKRON ART MUSEUM Date: 6:00 pm | Thursday, September 13, 2018 Location: Akron Art Museum 1 South High Street Akron, OH 44308 Poetry Reading with Wick Poetry Center and Urban Vision below the Nasser Al-Salem Arabi/Gharbi neon installation in the lobby of the Akron Art Museum. Stay and tour the exhibition FRONT: An American City after the reading. Register for free here. KENT CREATIVITY FESTIVAL Date: 11:00 am - 5:00 pm | Saturday, September 29, 2018 Location: Lester A. Lefton Esplanade outside of the May Prentice House,  Poetry Park The Kent community invites you to join us for the annual Kent Creativity Festival! This will be an opportunity for people of all ages and skill levels to come together to create, share, and explore the creation of all kinds of art.  THE STAN AND TOM WICK POETRY PRIZE READING FEATURING KHALED MATTAWA + MICHAEL MCKEE GREEN Date: 7:30 pm | Thursday, October 4, 2018 Location: Room 120, CAED (College of Architecture and Environmental Design, 132 S Lincoln St, Kent, OH 44240) A recipient of awards and grants from the Academy of American Poets and the Cabin Literary Center, Michael McKee Green is a 2018 artist in residence at the Boise Public Library at Bown Crossing. Poems of his appear in journals such as Michigan Quarterly Review, Tagvverk and Fog Machine, and his poem "In Remit" won the Burnam Poetry Scholarship (Judge, Ed Skoog). Currently, he is an MFA candidate at Boise State University, where he sits on Ahsahta Press’ editorial board and teaches creative writing. Khaled Mattawa was born in Benghazi, Libya, in 1964 and immigrated to the United States in his teens. His collections of poetry include Tocqueville (New Issues, 2010), Amorisco (Ausable, 2008), Zodiac of Echoes (Ausable, 2003), and Ismailia Eclipse (Sheep Meadow Press, 1995). He is also the author of Mahmoud Darwish: The Poet’s Art and His Nation (Syracuse University Press, 2014). Mattawa has also translated many volumes of contemporary Arabic poetry and coedited two anthologies of Arab American literature. Mattawa is the 2010 recipient of the Academy of American Poets Fellowship. He has received a Guggenheim fellowship, a translation grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Alfred Hodder Fellowship from Princeton University, the PEN American Center Poetry Translation Prize, three Pushcart Prizes, and a MacArthur Fellowship. In 2014, Mattawa was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Currently, Mattawa teaches in the graduate creative writing program at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. POETS + PAINTERS Date: 6:00 - 8:30 pm | Friday, October 19, 2018 Location: Group Ten Gallery (201 E Erie St, Kent, OH 44240) A collaboration of words and art between the artists of the Group Ten Gallery and the Wick Poetry Center. CELEBRATING OUR OWN + OPEN MIC POETRY NIGHT Date: 7:30 pm | Wednesday, October 24, 2018 Location: Room 306 ABC, Kent Student Center Come to celebrate poetry with us by sharing your poems and discovering the new voices around you. WORLD POETRY READING Date: 7:30 pm | Wednesday, November 14, 2018 Location: Room 120, CAED (College of Architecture and Environmental Design, 132 S Lincoln St, Kent, OH 44240) Kent State international students, staff and faculty members from different countries will share poems they love from their own cultures facilitating a global conversation through the intimate and inclusive voice of poetry. TRAVELING STANZAS INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT Date: January 24-February 24, 2019 Location: Taylor Hall The 2018-2019 school year marks the 10th anniversary of our Traveling Stanzas project. What began as a collaboration between Kent State University’s Wick Poetry Center and Professor Valora Renicker’s Visual Communication Design students has evolved into a leading international poetry exhibit pioneering state-of-the-art digital tools. With Traveling Stanzas, the Wick Poetry Center is at the forefront of a national movement to pair technology with art as a means to increase access to creative expression, encouraging new voices in poetry and facilitating meaningful conversations in communities around the world. This year we are excited to feature the following Traveling Stanzas projects  GEORGE BILGERE POETRY READING — CO-SPONSORED BY NEOMFA Date: 7:30 pm | Tuesday, February 19, 2019 Location: Room 306 ABC, Kent Student Center George Bilgere's seventh collection of poetry, Blood Pages, was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2018. He has given readings for the Library of Congress, the 92nd Street Y in New York, A Prairie Home Companion, and at schools and literary venues all over the country. He has received a Pushcart Prize, grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ohio Arts Council, the Midland Authors Prize, the May Swenson Poetry Prize, and the Fulbright Foundation. Former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins has called Bilgere's work "a welcome breath of fresh air in the house of American poetry." He teaches at John Carroll University in Cleveland. KATE DANIELS POETRY READING— SPONSORED BY RALPH AND JUDY KLETZIEN Date: 7:30 pm | Thursday, April 18, 2019 Location: Room 310, Kent Student Center Kate Daniels was born in Richmond, Virginia. The first in her family to graduate from college, Daniels earned a BA and an MA from the University of Virginia and an MFA from Columbia University. She converted to Catholicism as an adult, and her often lengthy, narrative poems engage engages themes of working-class experience, family, trauma, racism, and Southern culture. Daniels has won the Hanes Award for Poetry from the Fellowship of Southern Writers, a Pushcart Prize, the Louisiana Literature Prize for Poetry, the James Dickey Prize, the Crazyhorse Prize for Poetry, and fellowships from the Lannan Foundation and Harvard University's Bunting Institute. Her work has been widely anthologized, including in Best American Poetry. She has taught at Bennington College, Louisiana State University, the University of Virginia, and Wake Forest University. Currently, she is a professor of English and Creative Writing at Vanderbilt University. 17TH ANNUAL GIVING VOICE Date: 6:30 pm | Thursday, May 2, 2019 Location: Ballroom, Kent Student Center The 17th annual performance of Giving Voice features local students (grades 3-12), Kent State University undergraduate students and international scholars performing original poetry. All material is created in Wick outreach programs, including workshops led by Kent State University undergraduates enrolled in the service-learning course “Teaching Poetry in the Schools.” All events are free and open to the public.

We hope to see you at the readings!

In peace and poetry,        David Hassler    Director    Wick Poetry Center

Spoken Word Every Last Friday in Akron

Michael DeBenedictis has been hosting a poetry series the last Friday of every month at Nervous Dog Coffee Bar, 1530 W. Market Street in Akron, Ohio. The show often features music in addition to spoken word.

This month's installment (September 28th from 6 to 9 p.m.) features several Cleveland poets including Ray McNiece, Kisha Nicole Foster and John Burroughs.

Waiting for the Wind to Rise August 30th at Mac's Backs

poster by Christopher Franke

M.J. Arcangelini's new chapbook, Waiting for the Wind to Rise, was released today by Greater Cleveland's own NightBallet Press. Originally from Ohio, Arcangelini now lives in California but will be returning to Cleveland for a special book release event and reading on August 30th at Mac's Backs Books on Coventry.

Four Ohio Poets

A handful of books published by Ohio poets recently happened to cross my path, so I decided to read them to see what's new in Ohio. All of them had something to admire; I tend to judge books mostly on the strongest poems in them, not on the weaker ones, although none of the books had poems that I though were actually bad.

Invisible Fish, Susan F. Glassmeyer, Dos Madres Press 2018 (www.dosmadres.com)

Invisible Fish featured nature poems, interspersed with several poems that dealt with the narrator’s childhood in the land of “polished cotton pinafores, church bonnets, shiny shoes with bows, Friday night bingo”— laid out most explicitly in “From the Land of Stuffed Mangoes.” “Invisible Fish”, the title poem, was amusing and insightful, a nostalgic defense of naïveté and imagination against a world that laughs with those who fool you. Threaded through the book are poems about a darker side of the same upbringing, a tale of escaping from a cycle of family abuse and small-town oppression. Near the end, the prose-poem “Miss Carlton” is a poignant view of the other side, a brief slice of life of an inconsequential encounter in a grocery checkout line. One comment, though is that in my opinion, one dead animal poem would have been enough.

• Glassmeyer is interviewed about Invisible Fish here: http://ohiopoetryassn.blogspot.com/2018/10/casting-line-for-susan-glassmeyers.html

How the Universe Says Yes to Me, M. J. Werthman White, Main Street Rag Publishing 2017 (www.mainstreetrag.com)

How the Universe Says Yes to Me is a short book with a lighter take on the subject. A handful of the poems are simple list poems (most amusingly “Lies I’ve Told”), inviting the reader to draw the lines between the items.  It has a few very amusing poems where the universe itself is personified, including the title poem, and “The Universe Speaks,” in which the ways of the universe are hard to understand: I found these whimsical, somewhat surrealistic, and quite charming. Some of the poems are historical— “Tycho Brahe’s moose,” for example, is about a real moose that the astronomer Tycho Brahe really brought to parties; “For Alex, the African Grey Parrot” is an elegy for the death of the celebrated parrot of animal psychologist Irene Pepperberg, feaured (among other places) in Scientific American.

A Green Line Between Green Fields, Steve Abbott, Kattywompus Press 2018 (www.kattywompuspress.com)

A Green Line Between Green Fields is the only book of the four books here daring to venture into rhymed verse (although most of the work is unrhymed), with the rhyme (often slant) of “The Fool’s Boy” and “Trained.” I have to admit to an unabashed admiration for form— a twelve-stanza terza rima using only two rhymes (as in “The Fool's Boy") is not easy! “ The Torturer’s Daughter” ventures (obliquely) into political commentary; and “Pulling Yourself Up by Your—“ somewhat less obliquely. The title poem is a tribute to the late Maj Ragain, an anecdote showing his humor and wordplay, and a bit of his buddha-nature.

500 Cleveland Haiku, Michael Ceraolo, Writing Knights Press 2018 (https://writingknightspress.blogspot.com)
I have to admit to some degree of envy that Michael Ceraolo published this one first, since back in 2011, I published on the web my own haiku series, "52 Cleveland Haiku," with one Cleveland haiku for each week through the year (find it here, here, and here.).  So, Michael goes there and a few hundred more. His haiku (not to mention senryu, zappai, and various other 'ku forms) span the range from observations of the cityscape, to cynical observations about people and politics, very often focussing on observation of the many ways in which Cleveland is a very different city for the rich than for poor. He winds his way through the seasons of the city, watching with alternating compassion, passion, and scorn, celebrating the cracked concrete and the ice-covered lake equally.

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poet Mary Jo White is from Xenia, OH
Michael Ceraolo is from Cleveland, OH

poet Steve Abbott is a native of Columbus, OH

Susan F. Glassmeyer is from Cincinnati, OH

The Atlantic: how poetry came to matter again

A long article in this month's Atlantic about the new poets making poetry matter today:

• How Poetry Came to Matter Again: A young generation of artists is winning prizes, acclaim, and legions of readers while exploring identity in new ways.

The City returns!

Say, I see there's a new issue of The City Poetry, Lady K's 'zine of art and words: Summer 2018.
Check it out!

Misha Cat photo by Lady K

John Burroughs in Audio and Video--

John Burroughs

Our own John Burroughs got some exposure on the internet recently-- check him out on the "Talk With Me" podcast out of Lawrence Kansas, hosted by Marcia Epstein, where he talks about starting out in poetry, how he became a publisher, about his newest book, Loss and Foundering, and even reading a few poems:

• John Burroughs, Poet & Publisher on Talk With Me

And if you can't get enough of John, he's featured in a 40-minute video on "The CookBook" ("food/art/conversations"),  a video series brought out from the Sundress Academy for the Arts hosted by Darren C. Demaree and Christopher Bowen:

• John Burroughs at The CookBook

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Loss and Foundering (NightBallet Press)

Ten Years Old!

Clevelandpoetics: the blog just turned ten years old, with the first post by Michael Salinger announcing the blog on July 17, 2008.

Happy birthday to us! There's been 1,181 posts since then-- oops, that's 1,182 now-- and it's hard to believe we're still going. Year 11, here we come!

Now, with that said, if we're going to survive another year, I have to say we need your help-- we've always needed your help, and we need it now more than ever.  The blog isn't a one-man show: this blog belongs to the Cleveland poetry community: this blog is your blog.  

So, we want you to contribute. Join the team!  We want you!  Write up what happened at a poetry reading you attended, or a slam, or an author reading! Tell us about your philosophy of poetry, or why poetry is dead (or isn't dead)! Tell us why Cleveland is unique! Tell us about a poet we don't know, or about a part of the Cleveland poetry community that we haven't been covering-- Cleveland poetry is a big, big tent, and we each sometimes only see our only little corner of it: show us where poetry lives in your community.

Please-- we need you! We don't want your money-- Clevelandpoetics: the blog has been free (and ad-free!) since the beginning.  What we want is your posts.

Want to join team? Want to just write a guest post?  We want you.  Write us at clevelandpoetics@gmail.com and volunteer to join the team now!

Three acclaimed out-of-town poets 8/10 at Visible Voice Books

John Dorsey / Victor Clevenger / Jason Baldinger at 7:30 p.m. Open mic to follow.

Inkubator is coming

Literary Cleveland is once again holding their free Inkubator literary arts week, with events every evening from July 31 through August 3, and then the all-day Inkubator conference & book fair on Saturday August 4.

The event starts Tuesday, July 31st, with the Lit Cleveland Book Swap and NEOMFA reading at 6:30-9 pm at the Market Garden Brewery in Ohio City, 1947 W. 25th Street.

Check it out! You can register online.

• Literary Cleveland website
• Lit Calendar of events

Smith and Burroughs July 7th at Visible Voice Books in Tremont

Steven B. Smith is the author of Where Never Was Already Is [2018, Crisis Chronicles Press]. John Burroughs is the author of Loss and Foundering [2018, NightBallet Press]. They will read from their new books and more. An open mic will follow, for anyone else who wishes to share. For more info, visit www.visiblevoicebooks.com.

Firelands Writing Center presents Lynn Powell June 9th in Sandusky

Lots of upcoming events!

Cat Russell has posted a listing of some of the literary events coming up in Cleveland, Akron, and Canton on her blog. Looks like it will be a poetic summer!

(and if that's not enough for you, don't forget that John Burroughs keeps a longer list of upcoming poetic events right here on the clevelandpoetics blog... just scroll up to the top!  Or access it on google calendar.)

The Volume of Our  Incongruity 

by Diane Vogel Ferri

Poetry Chapbook  $14.99

PREORDER SHIPS SEPTEMBER 21, 2018

RESERVE YOUR COPY TODAY

Diane Vogel Ferri taught children with special needs for over thirty years. Her poems can be found in many journals including Plainsongs, Rockford Review, Poet Lore and Rubbertop Review. Diane has essays published by Scene Magazine, Cleveland Christmas Memories, and by Cleveland State University among others. She is the author of a poetry chapbook, Liquid Rubies and a novel, The Desire Path. She is a founding member of Literary Cleveland and a tutor at Seeds of Literacy.

Please mail all orders to the Finishing Line Press or order online at:

or go to www.finishinglinepress.com and type in the name or author.

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Reviews for The Volume of Our Incongruity:

A certain irresistible sincerity marks these poems. They invite us into sacred space, where grace and unapologetic longing reside and rule, where the singular voice we hear is so quiet and prayerful we must lean in to listen. The Volume of Our Incongruity, however, is more than a collection of poems. It’s a narrative, the story of a granddaughter, now recollected as one of eight “graphite markings on [a] basement two-by-four;” a wife, whose “love is a tundra, vast and white;” a mother, a “thirsty woman drinking every last drop of the sea.”   In language that is clear and deceptively simple, Diane Ferri reaches into a life lived deeply and pulls out truth.

–Lou Suarez, author of Ask and Traveler

In The Volume of Our Incongruity, Diane Ferri chronicles life-shaping moments by alternately slowing down the kind of speeding landscapes seen from a station wagon window, and zooming in to examine life’s discrepancies up close and in person. These are poems for our times, stirring a compelling swirl where the past intersects with the present, where hope for the future can spring from a single sonogram.

 –Gail Bellamy, author, poet and Cleveland Heights poet laureate, 2009 and 2010

These intimate, powerful poems about family, love, and memory settle on your skin and won’t wash off. Diane Ferri’s voice is every woman’s, grappling with being a wife, mother and individual. In this vividly rendered collection, the specific details of a life become something wondrous.

–Lee Chilcote, author of The Shape of Home

Hessler Street Fair winners!

Hessler Street Fair Poetry Anthology 2018, from Writing Knights

The Hessler Street Fair poet read on Wednesday night at the Happy Dog, hosted by Master of Ceremonies Azriel Johnson-- an evening of poetry & hot dogs.

The 2018 Hessler Street Fail Poetry Contest winners:

• First Place: Sy Castells, "Gender Confirmation"
• Second Place: Ross Martyn Hayes, "The Homonym Garnok"
• Third Place: Mary A. Turzillo, "Don't Mention You're From Cleveland"

Hessler poems will be performed on the main stage at the Hessler Street Fair on Sunday June 3rd, and broadcast live on WRUW-FM, 91.1 MHz (as well as live over the Internet).

The 2018 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Anthology is available at the Mac's Backs booth at the fair on June 2nd & 3rd, or buy it directly from Mac's Backs.

Tam e. Polzer reads her poem "Gotu Kola", as MC Azriel Johnson follows along 

• If you didn't catch the Hessler reading at Happy Dog, you can see it on video on Youtube at the Writing Knights site.

Celebrating Maj

Maj Ragain, one of Northeastern Ohio's most well-respected, and well loved, poets, died on April 19.

Michael Heaton says of Maj:
Ragain first came to Kent in the summer of 1969. He taught at Kent State University over the past six decades. He worked with a veterans' group through the Wick Poetry Center and Warriors' Journey Home, a healing circle for veterans. 

The Wick Poetry Center at Kent will be celebrating Maj's life and work on the weekend of June 1 to 3.  David Hassler writes:

A Celebration of the Life of Maj Ragain Join us June 1 to June 3 to celebrate the life and work of the late poet, mentor, teacher, and friend, Maj Ragain.  Friday, June 1 "HOME TO SARGASSO SEA" Art Exhibit Opening Paintings by Jessica Damen & Poems by Maj Ragain Downtown Gallery, 4-9 pm (Program begins at 7pm) 141 East Main St., Kent, OH Saturday, June 2 MEMORIAL SERVICE  RECEPTION Kent United Church of Christ 1pm 1400 E Main St., Kent, OH Sunday, June 3 COMMUNITY OPEN READING Venice Cafe, 4pm Bring a poem by Maj to share Music by The Numbers Band 163 W Erie St., Kent, OH Please visit the project website www.hometosargassosea.com: Home to Sargasso Sea    In peace and poetry,