Beachwood Library Kicks Off National Poetry Month with the Traveling Stanzas Project

On Thursday April 7 at 7 pm, The Beachwood Branch of Cuyahoga County Public Library, 25501 Shaker Blvd, is exited to kick off National Poetry Month with a program showcasing the Kent State University Wick Poetry Center Traveling Stanzas project. Join poets from Wick to explore the conversation of poetry through the new interactive Traveling Stanzas website. Participants will be able to create a video poem featuring a poem written in this interactive workshop, or record a poem written by a favorite poet. Teaching poets  will provide writing prompts, poems and ideas. Free and open to all! Please RSVP here or call 216-831-6868.

Thirty Days of Poetry Starts on Friday!

Diane Kendig writes:

Dear Poets:

The CCPL project which you all helped me pioneer for National Poetry Month is in its third year, starting this Friday. What some said would "never go" because "no one reads poetry" registered 400 readers the first day, which came up to 600 for the first year and now is up to 1200 registered readers with an extremely high rate of email openings. A book is coming out with an article by CCPL librarian Laurie Kincer on the success of the endeavor. Here are three updates for you on the project:

1) With the new Writers Center in the South Euclid Library, there has been shuffling of the web. If you thought your page had been disappeared, take heart. The library has remounted the 2014 and 2015 sites, where you can find your poem and continue to link/share it:

http://www.cuyahogalibrary.org/Services/William-N-Skirball-Writers-Center/Poetry.aspx#30days

2) Registration is now open to receive daily emails for this year's 30 poets/poems/prompts. If you registered in previous years, you are still registered. If not, or if you have new friends, classes, or relatives who would be interested, please share the link to get registered:

• Sign up for the E-mail!
• Visit the site!

3) Finally, you are invited to attend the two live events associated with this year's project:

• Saturday, April 2nd at 2:00 p.m. - A reading by Cleveland's own Amit Majmudar, the new Poet Laureate of the State of Ohio and our April 1st email. Details for registering here: http://www.cuyahogalibrary.org/Events/Event-Results/Event-Detail.aspx?id=83562 

• Saturday, April 30 at 2:00 p.m. - An open mic to punctuate the end of National Poetry Month. Details here: http://www.cuyahogalibrary.org/Events/Event-Results/Event-Detail.aspx?id=81740&et=Writing

If you have any questions about the month's events, feel free to contact me or our terrific librarian Laurie Kincer.

Christine Howey: the New Poet Laureate of Cleveland Heights!

Heights Arts has announced the news poet laureate of Cleveland Heights: Christine Howey.
Christine is quite well known in the local poetry community, participating in readings and on the Lake Effect Poetry slam team, and author and performer of the one woman play/poetry performance "Exact Change," which debuted in Akron, ran in Playhouse Square last summer, and then played in New York last fall.
Horray for Christine!

Teen Poetry Workshops in April at the Cleveland Public Library

Teen Open Mic and Writing for Change coming up at Lake Erie Ink

For more info on these and their other programs, please visit lakeerieink.org.

Lake Erie Ink
2843 Washington Blvd

Cleveland Heights, Ohio

(216) 320-4757

We also recommend following Lake Erie Ink on Facebook.

Meet Ohio Poet Laureate Amit Majmudar

Amit Majmudar

The new Ohio Poet Laureate, Amit Majmudar, will be reading in Cleveland on Saturday, April 2nd at 2:30 at the South Euclid-Lyndhurst Library. 

Local boy makes good: welcome him home.

See more here: 

• Meet Ohio Poet Laureate Amit Majmudar

2016 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest & Anthology

During the month of March 2016 Crisis Chronicles Press is accepting submissions for the 2016 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest and its corresponding anthology. Contest is free to enter and open to anyone age 14 and up. Winners will receive cash prizes and get to read their poems live at this year's Fair.

• 1st Place winning poet will receive $100
• 2nd Place winning poet will receive $50
• 3rd Place winning poet will receive $25

 

When and where:

Submissions will be accepted from March 1st to March 31st 2016. We will let you know by April 30th if your work has been accepted for the anthology. Poets will be invited to read their accepted works during the contest reading. The poetry contest reading will take place May 7th, 3 pm, at the Barking Spider Tavern, 11310 Juniper Road, near the campus of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Shortly after the reading, our panel of judges will select three winners to receive cash prizes and read live at the Hessler Street Fair itself.

The 2016 Hessler Street Fair will take place May 21st and 22nd from 11 am to dusk, rain or shine, on Hessler Road and Hessler Court in Cleveland. The exact time of winning poets' reading will be announced soon.

 

Before you submit, please read these guidelines:

• Submit up to 5 original poems or 5 images of your own original art via email to hesslerpoetry@crisischronicles.com (no snail mail entries, please).
• Please include your name, street address, city, state, zip code, telephone number and e-mail address with your submission(s).
• Please remember the deadline is midnight on March 31st. We will not have time to consider works submitted later than that.
• Poets and artists published in the book retain all rights to their work.
• Any accepted art work will be printed in black and white.
• Unpublished work is preferred. But previously published work is acceptable if we love it (let us know who the original publisher is so we may include them in our acknowledgments).
• The contest reading will be held at the Barking Spider Tavern on Saturday May 7th, 2016 at 3pm. About 20 minutes after all participating poets have read, the winners will be announced and prizes handed out. If you have won 1st, 2nd, or 3rd Place in the Hessler Street Fair Poetry Contest in the last three years, you are welcome to submit to the book and read your poem, but you will not be eligible to win a prize. Prize winners are also expected to read on the designated day during the Hessler Street Fair.

 

Contributor copies:

Contributors to the 2016 Hessler Street Fair Poetry Anthology will be able to purchase a copy of the book for half price from the Hessler Street Fair Booth during the Fair, or at Mac's Backs Books, 1820 Coventry Road in Cleveland Heights (216-321-2665 / macsbacks.com). We regret that we cannot afford to provide free contributor copies in print at this time. However, we will make a free pdf version of the book available to the public in late 2016.

 

FCC Guidelines:

Poetry has always been an integral part of the Hessler Street Fair, sometimes having its own stage on the street and sometimes combining with music on the main stage, but always doing something interesting. The top three winners will be given the opportunity to read from the stage at the Hessler Street Fair, simulcast on live radio and the web, during the Fair. Poetry read on air must not include any words designated to be obscene language by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

We welcome a diversity of styles and subject matter. Poems that don't meet the FCC guidelines can still be submitted and may be accepted for publication in the book. But they won't be eligible to win a prize since the winning poems will be read on air.

 

Special thanks to:

• Mac's Backs ~ Books on Coventry, 1820 Coventry Rd., Cleveland Heights, Ohio.
• Barking Spider Tavern, 11310 Juniper Road, Cleveland, Ohio.
• Crisis Chronicles Press, Cleveland, Ohio.

2016 William Redding Memorial Poetry Contest

The Poetry Forum

24^th Annual

William Redding Memorial Poetry Contest

     

FIRST PLACE

$100 and a Featured Reading May 2, 2016

SECOND PLACE

1-year membership in Columbus Salon monthly poetry workshop/critique

or

$50 Gift Certificate for books

                

THIRD PLACE

$25 Gift Certificate for books

Submission Guidelines:

• · Submit 3 typewritten or Word document poems.  One poem per page.
• · Maximum 50 lines per poem.
• · Surface mail entries should have name, address, phone number, and email address on back only of each poem. Send entries postmarked by March 14 to The Poetry Forum c/o 91 E. Duncan Street, Columbus OH 43202. Poems will not be returned. No SASE required.
• · Email entries to abbott4949@gmail.com as single Word document with poems as separate pages & no identifying information, with name, address, phone, and email on separate first page.
• · Previous first-place winners, Poetry Forum featured readers since January 2014, and previously published poems are ineligible.

Deadline:  March 15, 2016

The Poetry Forum thanks the following for their support: Bossy Grrl’s Pinup Joint, 90.5 WCBE-FM, our featured poets, open mic participants, audiences, and generous patrons.

Bossy Grrl's, 2598 N. High Street in Columbus

Visit our web site columbuspoetryforum.com

Information: 614/268-5006