Kleft Crisis 2018 and Steven Smith Book Launch

Where Never Was Already Is by Smith
(2018, Crisis Chronicles Press)

This weekend, Crisis Chronicles Press (out of Cleveland) and Kleft Jaw Press (out of Denver) celebrate National Poetry Month by presenting a Friday/Saturday litfest you won't want to miss featuring authors from across the United States at three of the best bookstores in Ohio. Then Ray McNiece will follow it up on Sunday with a Tongue-in-Groove Poetry Jam featuring Cleveland art/poetry legend Steven Smith, whose new book, Where Never Was Already Is, was just published this month by Crisis Chronicles.

Friday 4/20, 7pm till ? at Guide to Kulchur Books
5222 Lorain Ave., Cleveland, OH 44102
featuring readings by
Iris Appelquist (Kansas City, MO)
Steve Brightman (Akron, OH)
John Burroughs (Cleveland, OH)
Ryder Collins (Milwaukee, WI)
Azriel Johnson (Canton, OH)
Mark S Kuhar (Medina, OH)
Frankie Metro (Denver, CO)
Jeanette Powers (Kansas City, MO)
Austin Price (New York, NY)
Gabriel Ricard (East Northport, NY)
Margie Shaheed (Memphis, TN)
Nathanael Stolte (Buffalo, NY)
RA Washington (Cleveland, OH)

Saturday 4/21, 2pm to 4pm at Main Street Books
104 N. Main St,, Mansfield, OH 44902
emcee: Mark Sebastian Jordan
featuring readings by
Iris Appelquist (Kansas City, MO)
Frankie Metro (Denver, CO)
Jeanette Powers (Kansas City, MO)
Gabriel Ricard (East Northport, NY)
plus open mic

Saturday 4/21, 7pm to 10pm at Mac's Backs
1820 Coventry Rd., Cleveland Heights, OH 44118
featuring readings by
Dianne Borsenik (Elyria, OH)
Theresa Brightman (Akron, OH)
Christina Brooks (Detroit, MI)
Shelley Chernin (Novelty, OH)
Ryder Collins (Milwaukee, WI)
Juliet Cook (Medina, OH)
Steve Goldberg (Cleveland, OH)
Clarissa Jakobsons (Aurora, OH)
Alynn Mahle (Mentor, OH)
Austin Price (New York, NY)
Heather Ann Schmidt (Oberlin, OH)
Margie Shaheed (Memphis, TN)
Kathy Smith (Cleveland, OH)
Steven Smith (Cleveland, OH)
Nathanael Stolte (Buffalo, NY)

Sunday 4/22, 6pm at the Millard Fillmore Presidential Library
15617 Waterloo Rd., Cleveland, Ohio 44110
Tongue-in-Groove Poetry Jam
emceed by Ray McNiece
featuring a performance by Steven Smith
plus open mic (your chance to perform with the band)

Please come celebrate with us!

Return of the Haiku Death Match:This Saturday

Just in case you missed it: the sixth Not-exactly-annual Heights Arts "Haiku Deathmatch" is coming up this Saturday, April 21, at the Ensemble theatre.  Cleveland Haiku master Ray McNiece will be defending his title against seven haiku challengers:

• Michael Ceraolo
• Lorraine Cipriano
• Christine Donofrio
• Cordelia Eddy
• Azriel Johnson
• Pat Robertell-Hudson
• Bill Schubert

Always fun to see who will win the face-off of haiku masters.

Saturday, April 21, 2018 at 7 p.m.

Ensemble Theatre
2843 Washington Blvd.
Cleveland Hts., OH

Order your tickets NOW and support our literary arts programming!

Members: $10.00
General Admission: $15.00

TICKETS

• Heights Arts Haiku Deathmatch

A Dozen Ways To Revel In Poetry

image by xXRavenSongXx

For National Poetry Month, Laura Grace Weldon gives us A Dozen Ways To Revel In Poetry:

Leave poems where they’ll be discovered... Pull a poem from a hat... Dine with poetry...

April and the City

Easter Lake by Smith (from the City poetry Winter Spring 2018

Today is April Fool's Day, Easter, and the first day of National Poetry Month, and in celebration, the City Poetry 'zine has their Winter Spring 2018 issue out.

Cleveland Public Library also has the first day of their "Read+Write: 30 Days of Poetry" posted, with the poem "Tall Skeleton" (by South Euclid poet Patrick Culliton), along with the first of thirty poem-writing prompts.  It's not too late to sign up for their 30 Days of Poetry mailing list, and get a link to a poem and a prompt every day in April.

And the Writing Knights has their own poetry challenge (and poetry prompts) for April: not a poem a day, but ten poems in thirty days. Azriel invites you to join their roundtable on Facebook to write and discuss.

• Follow ReadWritePoetry on Twitter