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2021 Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Readings Series: The Spiritual in Poetry with Leonard Gontarek

In many ways, writing poems and the reading of poems are spiritual acts. The poem resembles a prayer. It can be an invocation or a plea. Its origin is a sacred memory and its source, an illumination. Leonard Gontarek will discuss this through examples of his own poetry, in conversation with Charles Carr.

Leonard Gontarek is the author of seven books of poems, including Take Your Hand Out of My Pocket, Shiva. His poems have appeared in Field, Poet Lore, Verse Daily, Fence, Poetry Northwest, American Poetry Review, Joyful Noise: An Anthology of American Spiritual Poetry, and The Best American Poetry. He coordinates Peace/Works, Poetry In Common, Philly Poetry Day, hosts The Green Line Reading & Interview Series, he conducts the poetry workshop: Making Poems That Last. His poem, 37 Photos From The Bridge, selected by Alice Quinn, was a Poetry winner for the Big Bridges MotionPoems project and the basis for the award-winning film sponsored by the Weisman Art Museum.

Charles S. Carr, Host