Live Poetry: Robert Coles, Alison Hicks, and Roland Leander Williams
2025-02-12 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Live Poetry: Robert Coles, Alison Hicks, and Roland Leander Williams
Wednesday February 12, 2025 – 7:00pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street
For Zoom, register here:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/4vYhPZXETFGJrideJAk8-Q#/registration
Robert Coles has published over one hundred poems in various journals, anthologies, and magazines.
Alison Hicks was finalist for the 2021 Beullah Rose prize from Smartis Pace, and Editor’s Choice selection for the 2024 Philadelphia Stories National Poetry Prize, and nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
Massimo Lavelle will read on behalf of Roland Leander Williams is a professor and chair of the English department at Temple University, where he teaches courses on African-American culture and American society. He is the author of three books and has published fiction and poetry inspired by his life in the city.
Open Reading Follows

Live Poetry: Kat Giordano, Carol Moog, Lester Mobley, and Tara Tamburello
2025-02-19 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday February 19 at 7pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/s1lCXplISbCpSTMX_DE2UQ
Kat Giordano was born in Philadelphia and it’s been downhill ever since. Their latest poetry collection, Thumbsucker, is out via Malarkey Books. Kat tweets at @giordkat and lives on the internet at katgiordano.com. Kat is very cool. You like them.

Carol Moog will read from her debut poetry collection She Sat But Not Still (Tell Tell Poetry). She is a practicing psychologist, professional musician (harmonica) and author of “Are They Selling Her Lips?” (William Morrow) and The Autism Playbook for Teens (New Harbinger). She can also be found improvising with Tongue and Groove Spontaneous Theater, and voicing vintage radio plays. She has never understood why people tell children to sit still.
Lester Mobley was born on Long Island New York before moving to Philadelphia at the age of 18 where he has remained ever since. He is a retired union building tradesmen who has dabbled on and off with poetry since elementary school. His favorite poets whom he reveres and attempts to emulate are Charles Bukowski’s who he describes as being urban, seamy and modern, and the innovative groundbreaking mid-19th century stylings of Walt Whitman. Everyone else as he always maintains, remain respectfully peripheral.
Tara Tamburello was the 2023 Poet Laureate of Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Her short fiction and poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Schuylkill Valley Journal, Ghost City Review, Bone Parade, Rust + Moth, and other journals and anthologies. She is a past winner of the Bucks County Short Fiction Contest and received Eastern University’s Dorothy McCollum Siebert Award for creative writing. She lives in the Philly suburbs with her husband, two children, and cat.

Sean Hanrahan Hosts – Open Reading Follows

Remembering Gerald Stern
2025-02-23 14:00 - 16:00 | Virtual
Sunday, February 23, 2025
2pm Eastern virtual
Register for Zoom here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/P35CdROtSy2NBi1XJHF3lg
Gerald Daniel Stern (February 22, 1925 – October 27, 2022) was an American poet, essayist, and educator. The author of twenty collections of poetry and four books of essays, he taught literature and creative writing at Temple University, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Raritan Valley Community College and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. From 2009 until his death, he was a distinguished poet-in-residence and faculty member of Drew University’s graduate program for a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in poetry.
Stern was a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh and Columbia University and attended the University of Paris for post-graduate study. He received the National Book Award for Poetry in 1998 for This Time: New and Selected Poems and was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 1991 for Leaving Another Kingdom: Selected Poems. In 2000, Governor Christine Todd Whitman appointed him the first Poet Laureate of New Jersey.
Submit to the Remembering Gerald Stern anthology here by February 16th to be included in our anthology.

Live Poetry: Samantha Medina, Amanda Nicole Meadeis, and Skyler Norbury
2025-02-26 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Live Poetry: Samantha Medina, Amanda Nicole Meadeis, and Skyler Norbury
Wednesday, February 26, 7pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street
And on Zoom – Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/d9r8978JQ-CQKRC4mzSTbA
Samantha Medina is a writer based in South Philadelphia. Her poetry touches on feminism and how to explore the cracks.
Amanda Nicole Meadeis a poet, artist, tarot card reader, and actress from Limerick, PA. With a penchant for cute things – and a knack for making up amalgam-words – her work is a reflection of herself and how she interprets the energy of the world around her, you are invited to look and listen to her works as you wish.
‘Just be forewarned of the juxtapositional nature of their existence’.
Skyler Norbury is a versatile visual artist who explores the interconnectedness of human experience through a range of different mediums. Drawing inspiration from personal encounters and spiritual reflections, she creates work that invites viewers to connect on a deeper, universal level. With a penchant for collaging found objects and other eclectic elements, the result often offers a blend of nostalgia and contemporary expression. Skyler’s pieces offer both playfulness and profound intuition, offering a unique perspective on the human journey.
Mac Chandler Hosts
Open Reading Follows

Live Poetry: Sarah Browning, W. D. Ehrhart, and Jack Miller
2025-03-05 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday March 5th, 2025 – 7:00pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/vLVubHweQumhe0GM3rq9nA
Sarah Browning is the author of Call Me Yes (forthcoming), Killing Summer, and others, co-host of Wild Indigo Poetry, and teaches online with Writers in Progress.
W.D. Ehrhart’s most recent books are Thank You for Your Service: Collected Poems; What We Can and Can’t Afford: Essays on Vietnam, Patriotism, and American Life, and At Smedley Butler’s Grave (a Moonstone Arts poetry chapbook).
Jack Miller is a former English teacher who retired after a long career at Ocean City High School. The author of a recently published autobiographical poetry book called Habit: Seven Decades of Poems, his first collection, he is a lover of nature who enjoys birds, butterflies, woods and swamps.
Open Reading Follows

Live Broadcast: Nathalie Anderson
2025-03-11 18:30 - 20:30 | virtual
Tuesday March 11th, 2025 at 6:30pm – Live Broadcast
Moonstone Poetry @ PhillyCam
Can be viewed on the Phillycam website or Cable 66/966HD/967 or Verizon FIOS, 29/30 in Philadelphia.
Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Readings Series
Nathalie Anderson’s books of poetry include Following Fred Astaire, Crawlers, Quiver, Stain, and the chapbook Held and Firmly Bound. She collaborated in 2021 with artist Susan Hagen and poet Lisa Sewell on Birds of North America, and her new book, Rough, is forthcoming in 2024 from The Word Works. Anderson’s poems have appeared in such journals as Atlanta Review, DoubleTake, Natural Bridge, The New Yorker, Nimrod, and Plume. She has also authored libretti for five operas, in collaboration with Philadelphia composer Thomas Whitman. Anderson manages the list-serv Lit-Philly that informs about 500 members about literary events in the Philadelphia area. She has recently retired from Swarthmore College, where she taught as Alexander Griswold Cummins Professor of English Literature, and served as Director of the Program in Creative Writing.
Charles S. Carr hosts.

Live Poetry: Catch Breath, Amanda Giordano Herrera, and Matthew Sekellick
2025-03-12 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday March 12, 2025 – 7:00pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/zgOiWqUUT6OxURZIbzujjw
catch breath is the founder of reunion poetry, a literary festival held in Philadelphia.
Amanda Giordano Herrera is an interdisciplinary artist and writer born in Philadelphia. She is an editor for Poet’s Row. Her personal work examines surrealism, death, rebirth and religion.
Matthew Sekellick is a writer, artist and performer from Upstate New York living in Philadelphia. A poet, playwright, essayist and critic, their writing has appeared in Protean, Prolit, Peach Mag, Jacobin, and Theatre Journal, among others. His plays include Picnic Among Tall Grasses, The Life (and Afterlife) of Uncle Sam, and an adaptation of the film noir Detour. He writes about theater in his newsletter, Plays Unpleasant. sekellick.net
Amy Saul-Zerby Hosts – Open Reading Follows

Live Poetry: Happy Saint Patrick's Day!
2025-03-18 17:00 - 19:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Tuesday March 18, 2025 – 5:00pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/Q3BIKrZhRjOSQ_BFscJ85A
Nathalie Anderson, author of Rough, Following Fred Astaire, Crawlers, Quiver, Stain, and the chapbook Held and Firmly Bound. She collaborated with Susan Hagen and Lisa Sewell on Birds of North America. Anderson’s poems have appeared in such journals as Atlanta Review, DoubleTake, Natural Bridge, The New Yorker, Nimrod, and Plume and authored libretti for five operas. She has recently retired from Swarthmore College, where she taught as Alexander Griswold Cummins Professor of English Literature, and served as Director of the Program in Creative Writing.
Joseph Lennon is Emily C. Riley Director of the Center for Irish Studies at Villanova University, where he also is Associate Dean, Professor of English, and Co-Director of Villanova’s Strategic Initiative for Climate, Justice and Sustainability. His forthcoming book, Marion Wallace-Dunlop and the Origins of the Hunger Strike will be published in 2026. He writes poetry, essays, and scholarship on Irish and transnational literature and culture, focusing on histories of the hunger strike in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Russia, and India. He has published poetry in New Hibernia Review, Poetry Ireland, Natural Bridge, Denver Quarterly, and Salmon Poetry published his Fell Hunger in 2011; he is editing a forthcoming issue of the American Journal of Irish Studies on “Sustainability in Irish Culture.”
Stephen Sexton’s first book, If All the World and Love Were Young was the winner of the Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2019 and the Shine / Strong Award for Best First Collection. He was awarded the E. M. Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature in 2020. He was the winner of the National Poetry Competition in 2016 and the recipient of an Eric Gregory Award in 2018. Cheryl’s Destinies was published in 2021, and was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection. Wake Forest University Press reissued both collections in North America in 2024.
Open Reading Follows

Live Poetry: C.M. Crockford, R.G. Evans, Shannon Frost Greenstein, and Von Wise
2025-03-19 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday March 19, 2025 – 7:00pm
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/s1AkTaeNSISE_wCCV7KJSg
C.M. Crockford is a neurodivergent writer and editor. His works been published in dozens of magazines, anthologies, and websites, and his first book Birdsongs was released in 2024 with Alien Buddha Press. You can always find him doting on his cat Wally or seeing movies in actual theaters like a nerd.
R.G. Evans’s books include Overtipping the Ferryman, The Holy Both, and Imagine Sisyphus Happy. His work has appeared in Rattle, Painted Bride Quarterly, and Weird Tales, among other publications. His collections of original songs, Sweet Old Life and Kid Yesterday Calling Tomorrow Man, are available on most streaming platforms. He received a 2025 Individual Artist Fellowship award from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.
Shannon Frost Greenstein (She/They) resides near Philadelphia with her family and cats. She is the author of “Through the Lens of Time” (2026), a fiction collection with Thirty West Publishing, and “These Are a Few of My Least Favorite Things” (2022), a book of poetry from Really Serious Lit. Shannon is a former Ph.D. candidate in Continental Philosophy and a multi-time Pushcart Prize nominee. Her passions include Friedrich Nietzsche, anti-racism, ballet, the Seven Summits, the Hamilton Soundtrack, motherhood, and acquiring more cats.
Von Wise is the author of Grow a Cowboy, winner of the 2025 Beyond Words Poetry Chapbook Awards. His poetry and prose have been published and anthologized by Lucky Jefferson, Inverted Syntax, Gulf Stream Literary Magazine, Red Ogre Review, and elsewhere. He teaches English and Creative Writing in Philadelphia, where he lives.
Sean Hanrahan Hosts – Open Reading Follows

World Poetry Day Reading
2025-03-23 14:00 - 16:00 | virtual
Sunday March 23, 2025 – 2pmEST – VIRTUAL
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/LqG9LovqQnCdUxVCaQ1PHg3/26/2025
World Poetry Day Reading – The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) founded this day in 1999. Poetry uses rhythms and imagery to elicit emotion and the imagination of the reader. Poetry can rhyme, using what are called meters of long and short syllables. Some poetry, written in what’s called ‘free verse,’ doesn’t employ rhyme or meters. Poems are broken into stanzas, which are like paragraphs, and can be up to 12 lines long. We believe the first known poem appeared 4,000 years ago in Babylon. Today, countless types of poems are available to enjoy, including haikus, limericks, sonnets, and ballads.

Live Poetry: The Hosts of Other Series Read
2025-03-26 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday March 26, 2025 – 7:00pm – The Hosts of Other Series Read
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street and on zoom – Use this link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/RcZsDsGjRYmxq7LxQ_YDkQ
Sibelan Forrester is a poet, translator, and host since 2016 of the Mad Poets Society First Wednesday poetry reading series.
Raina J. León, co-host of Wild Indigo Poetry Reading Series, is s a founding editor of The Acentos Review.
Bill Van Buskirk’s, host of Mad Poets Society 4th Friday series, latest book is The Poet’s Pocket Guide to Steady Employment.
Noah David Roberts is a non-binary poet, the author of Mutable, GUNK, and SWARM, an organizer of the World’s End Writing Retreat, & was an editor for Graphic Violence Lit.
BJ Ward, host of Warren Community College Visiting Authors Series, is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize and two Distinguished Artist Fellowships from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.

Conflict & Poetry: An Interactive Workshop
2025-03-30 14:00 - 16:00 | The Rotunda, 14014 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, United States
Conflict & Poetry: An Interactive Workshop
Sunday, March 30th at 2PM EST
Live at The Rotunda, 4014 Walnut St., Philadelphia, PA 19104
Register for the live event

In a time fraught with political strife and armed conflict, how can we reframe, heal, and continue to live in the midst of destruction, chaos, and loss? We seem to have forgotten that we are all human beings. Where is our empathy? How do we reconcile? How do we survive? In an effort to inspire people embroiled in conflict (all of us), to meet and create dialogue across differences for the sake of resolving heartbreak, damage and personal or cultural loss.
Australian authors, David B. Moore and Alike Vernon, writers of Setting Relations Right in Restorative Practice, have provided the backgrounds and the methods for humane ways to make peace. They will share knowledge on the possibilities occasioned by people seeking repair and resolution.

Restorative practice uses deliberative decision-making processes to:

respond to harm with healing in justice system programs;
manage relationships in educational, workplace, and other communities; &
link individual healing with institutional reform in redress schemes.

Dr David Moore and Dr Alikki Vernon are Australian ‘pracademics’, who remain actively engaged with fellow educators and researchers while working as facilitators in each of these applications.
In their 2024 book Setting Relations Right in Restorative Practice, they explain how:

restorative processes support people to learn, heal, and work together to improve their circumstances;
techniques from restorative practice can also assist citizens’ assemblies to develop socially acceptable and appropriately complex policies for government.

The reforming potential of restorative practice is great. The need for further restorative reform urgent. Practical skills are essential for that reform.
Dr Moore and Dr Vernon will describe:

core skills for facilitating different restorative processes;
programs that apply these skills, to work with people to set relations right.

The audience and poets will participate with Moore and Vernon to consider pathways out of the impasses that inhibit our creativity as humans.

Register for the interactive workshop.

Submit to our Chaos/Crises/Conflict anthology here by March 9th.

Anthology Reading: Chaos, Crises, Conflict
2025-03-31 19:00 - 21:00 | virtual
Monday March 31, 2025 – 7pmEST – Chaos, Crises, Conflict Anthology Reading – VIRTUAL
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/o5aORNAuQH6qAzaYCOI-Yg
In a time fraught with political strife and armed conflict, how can we reframe, heal, and continue to live in the midst of destruction, chaos, and loss? We seem to have forgotten that we are all human beings. Where is our empathy? How do we reconcile? How do we survive? Poets Respond

Live Poetry: Courtney Bambrick, Caroline M. Mar, Hayden Saunier, and Robert Zaller
2025-04-02 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday April 2, 2025 – 7:00pm – LIVE
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street
On Zoom – Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/IMJG5oarQqGAkXCjjv6H6A
Courtney Bambrick, author of World Without, teaches writing at Thomas Jefferson University’s East Falls, was poetry editor at Philadelphia Stories.

Caroline M. Mar, author of Water Guest, Special Education, and Dream of the Lake, a member of Rabble Collective, and serves on the board of Friends of Writers.

Hayden Saunier is the author of six poetry collections including her new book, Wheel, awards include a Pushcart Prize, Pablo Neruda Award, and Rattle Poetry Prize.

Robert Zaller is Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at Drexel University. Poet, critic, and historian, his books of verse include Speaking to Power and The Dresden Zoo.

Live Reading: Featured Poets 2024
2025-04-06 14:00 - 16:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Sunday April 6, 2025 – 2pm EDT
LIVE – 2024 Featured Poets
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street
On Zoom – Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/_t25rgq-TDyw9s-2xGxuCw
In 2024, Moonstone Arts Center hosted almost 100 events with nearly 200 poets, both local and international. 75 of those featured poets contributed to this anthology and will read with us again.
Buy the Featured Poets 2024 anthology here.
Featured Poets 2024
(not all poets will be reading, some will also read at the virtual event)

Liz Abrams-Morley
Nathalie Anderson
Katherine Antarikso
Cynthia Arrieu-King
Madeline Artenberg
Subhaga Crystal Bacon
Fran Baird
Elliott batTzedek
Herman Beavers
Sarah Browning
Chris Bullard
Steve Burke
L.M. Camiolo
Jane-Rebecca Cannarella
Charles S. Carr

Sydney Coffin
Cathleen Cohen
Bernard Collins
Savannah Cooper-Ramsey
Jessica Cuello
Raheem Curry
Eileen D’Angelo
Guy D’Annolfo
Thomas Devaney
John DiMenna
Susan DIPronio
David Eberhardt
WD Ehrhart
Michael Franz
Leonard Gontarek

Sean Hanrahan
Faleeha Hassan
William Hazard
Ditta Baron Hoeber
Randi Hoffman
Rachael Ikins
Jack Israel
Stephen Jones
Linda Kleinbub
Jonathan Koven
Matt Lake
Lynn Levin
Elliott Levin
M.J. Liebler
Olga Livshin

Jennifer Maloney
Emiliano Martin
Julianna May
Chris McCreary
Matt McGarvey
Alexandra McIntosh
Pat McLean-Smith
Diane McManus
C.O. MOED
Marjorie Moorhead
Michelle Myers
Allayna Nofs
Am(i)lia Pikovsky
g emil reutter
Patrick Rodgers

Zack Rogow
Lauren Russell
Diane Sahms-Guarnieri
Hayden Saunier
Clinton Smith
Juniper Sweeney
Mary Tarantini
Alan Toltzis
Peter Webb
Theresa Werba
Daniel Williams
Kimmika Williams-Witherspoon
Samantha Wright
Monika Wysong
Robert Zaller

Virtual: Featured Poets 2024
2025-04-07 19:00 - 21:00 | Virtual
Monday, April 7th — 2pm
VIRTUAL – 2024 Featured Poets
On Zoom – Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/lfcdsIFeTdGAdAm0v0FnkQ
In 2024, Moonstone Arts Center hosted almost 100 events with nearly 200 poets, both local and international. 75 of those featured poets contributed to this anthology and will read with us again.
Buy the Featured Poets 2024 anthology here.
Featured Poets 2024
(not all poets will be reading, some will also read at the live event)

Liz Abrams-MorleyNathalie Anderson
Katherine Antarikso
Cynthia Arrieu-King
Madeline Artenberg
Subhaga Crystal Bacon
Fran Baird
Elliott batTzedek
Herman Beavers
Sarah Browning
Chris Bullard
Steve Burke
L.M. Camiolo
Jane-Rebecca Cannarella
Charles S. Carr
Sydney CoffinCathleen Cohen
Bernard Collins
Savannah Cooper-Ramsey
Jessica Cuello
Raheem Curry
Eileen D’Angelo
Guy D’Annolfo
Thomas Devaney
John DiMenna
Susan DIPronio
David Eberhardt
WD Ehrhart
Michael Franz
Leonard Gontarek

Sean HanrahanFaleeha Hassan
William Hazard
Ditta Baron Hoeber
Randi Hoffman
Rachael Ikins
Jack Israel
Stephen Jones
Linda Kleinbub
Jonathan Koven
Matt Lake
Lynn Levin
Elliott Levin
M.J. Liebler
Olga Livshin

Jennifer MaloneyEmiliano Martin
Julianna May
Chris McCreary
Matt McGarvey
Alexandra McIntosh
Pat McLean-Smith
Diane McManus
C.O. MOED
Marjorie Moorhead
Michelle Myers
Allayna Nofs
Am(i)lia Pikovsky
g emil reutter
Patrick Rodgers

Zack RogowLauren Russell
Diane Sahms-Guarnieri
Hayden Saunier
Clinton Smith
Juniper Sweeney
Mary Tarantini
Alan Toltzis
Peter Webb
Theresa Werba
Daniel Williams
Kimmika Williams-Witherspoon
Samantha Wright
Monika Wysong
Robert Zaller

Live Broadcast: Grady Chambers
2025-04-08 18:30 - 20:30 | virtual
Tuesday April 8, 2025 – 6:30pm – Live Broadcast
Can be viewed on the Phillycam website Or Cable 66/966HD/967 or Verizon FIOS, 29/30 In Philadelphia.
Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Readings Series
Grady Chambers is the author of the novel Great Disasters and the poetry collection North American Stadiums, selected by Henri Cole as the winner of the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize. His poems and stories can be found in The Atlantic, The Paris Review, American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, Poetry Magazine, The Sun, Joyland, Image, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere.
Charles S. Carr, Host

Live Poetry: Jane-Rebecca Cannarella, Krystle Griffin, and Anne-Adele Wight
2025-04-09 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday April 9, 2025 – 7:00pm – LIVE
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street
Join us for the Book Launch of Long Island Sad Poems by Jane-Rebecca Cannarella (Serotonin Press)
Jane-Rebecca Cannarella edits HOOT Review, a magazine published on postcards, Meow Meow Pow Pow Lit, a broadside press, and was an editor for Lunch Ticket. She will be joined by:
Krystle Griffin is a writer, actor, artist, and Swiss army knife of all trades, trying to spin brain bees and nightmares into something shiny.
Anne-Adele Wight is the author four books of poetry. Her work has appeared in American Writing, Philadelphia Poets, Tabula Rasa, Shrike, Mad Poets Review, Philadelphia Writers’ Conference Anthology, and The Dariens.
Sean Lynch Hosts – Open Reading Follows

Live Poetry: Julia Kolchinsky's PARALLAX
2025-04-12 19:00 - 21:00 | Fleisher Art Memorial, 719 Catharine Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19147, United States
April 12, 2025 – 7pm EDT- LIVE
Live at Fleisher Art Memorial, 719 Catharine Street
Join us as we celebrate the release of Julia Kolchinsky’s new book PARALLAX
Julia Kolchinsky’s Parallax offers a lyrical narrative of parenting a neurodiverse child under the shadow of the ongoing war in Ukraine, the poet’s birthplace. As her child expresses a fascination with death and violence, Kolchinsky struggles to process the war unfolding far away, on the same soil where so many of her ancestors perished during the Holocaust. Julia Kolchinsky is the author of PARALLAX, 40, Don’t Touch the Bones, and The Many Names for Mother.
Julia will be joined by these terrific poets: Sarah Browning, Steven Kleinman, Olgq Livshin, and Artress Bethany White

Live Poetry: E. Lynn Alexander, Peter Baroth, Julia Gwiazdowski, and George Schaefer
2025-04-16 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday April 16, 2025 – 7:00pm – LIVE
Live at Fergie’s Pub,1214 Sansom Street
E. Lynn Alexander is an artist, poet, and “crazy cat lady” from the Lehigh Valley. She is a partnering artist and writer in the Perspectives: Art on Environment project at the Nurture Nature Center.
Peter Baroth, author of Long Green and Lost Autograph is a writer, artist, and musician. He has been published in Philadelphia Poets, Red Fez, Schuylkill Valley Journal, Apiary, and others.
Julia Gwiazdowski is a poet, musician, zine maker, and the resident Sappho of Philadelphia, author of 31 Days of Venus Aphrodite, illustrated and formatted by dear friend and collaborator, Jesse Arbor.
George Schaefer is a Philly born poet, philosopher and prankster. He started writing over 4 decades ago in an attempt to make some sense of this crazy world. All these years later, he’s as confused as ever but still clinging to the belief that the word can lead to wisdom.
Sean Hanrahan Hosts – Open Reading Follows

International Haiku Poetry Day
2025-04-20 14:00 - 16:00 | Virtual
Sunday April 20, 2025 – 2pm EDT – VIRTUAL
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/0vQ-qLRCTqaki87Hoxes8A
International Haiku Poetry Day (April 17) was started in 2007 and later taken on by The Haiku Foundation in celebration of National Poetry Month (April). According to The Haiku Foundation, the haiku is an ancient and undefinable-in-English form of Japanese poetry. At its most basic, it is three lines, the first with five syllables, the second with seven and the third with five.

Live Poetry: Thomas Devaney, Sean Lynch, and Kim Gek Lin Short
2025-04-23 19:00 - 21:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday April 23, 2025 – 7:00pm – LIVE
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street
Thomas Devaney is a poet, facilitator, educator and author of Getting to Philadelphia and You Are the Battery. His work is featured in Best American Poetry 2019.
Sean Lynch, author of five, has been the editor of various magazines, journals, anthologies, and books, and is the Founding Editor of Serotonin Press.
Kim Gek Lin Short is the author of China Cowboy and The Bugging Watch & Other Exhibits. Her poems and stories appear in numerous anthologies. With Ryan Eckes, she runs Radiator Press.
Anne-Adele Wight Hosts, Open Reading Follows

World Press Freedom Day
2025-05-04 00:00 - 23:59 | Virtual
Sunday May 4, 2025 – VIRTUAL – World Press Freedom Day
The United Nations General Assembly declared May 3 to be World Press Freedom Day or just World Press Day, observed to raise awareness of the importance of freedom of the press and remind governments of their duty to respect and uphold the right to freedom of expression enshrined under Article 19 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and marking the anniversary of the Windhoek Declaration, a statement of free press principles put together by African newspaper journalists in Windhoek in 1991. Send us a poem.

Live Poetry: Sarah Browning, W.D. Ehrhart, Jack Miller
2025-05-05 19:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States

Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Reading Series
2025-05-06 18:30 - 19:30 | PA
Tuesday May 6, 2025 – 6:30pm – Live Broadcast
On the Phillycam website or Cable 66/966HD/967 or Verizon FIOS, 29/30 – Philly
Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Readings Series
David Kertis, author of Word of the Day. was born in 1955 and grew up in northern New Jersey. He attended Oberlin College where he studied creative writing with David Young, and has lived in Philadelphia since 1978. He is married and works as a claims adjuster. In Philadelphia, he has studied with Leonard Gontarek and Eleanor Wilner. He has been published on line in Frigate and Apiary and given a number of readings in the Philadelphia area. His book, Word of the Day, has recently been published. Charles S. Carr, Host

Live Poetry: Grace Bauer, Majorie Maddox, Amy Small-McKinney
2025-05-07 19:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Wednesday May 7, 2025 — 7:00 pm – LIVE
Live at Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street
Grace Bauer is a Philadelphia-based poet who has published six books of poems—most recently Unholy Heart: New and Selected Poems (Backwaters Press).
Marjorie Maddox is a Professor of English at Lock Haven University as well as an author who has published 17 collections of poetry among other works.
Amy Small-McKinney is the author of two full-length books and three chapbooks. Her newest chapbook, One Day I Am A Field, was published by Glass Lyre Press (April,2022). She resides in Philadelphia.
Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows

2024 Moonstone Chapbook Contest Winners
2025-05-11 14:00 | PA
Sunday May 11, 2025 – 2:00 pm – VIRTUAL On Zoom – 2024 Moonstone Chapbook Contest Winners
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/VJprZxhkRxGtL6tgxl7bkA
First Prize – Partridge Boswell, author of Heckler, poems appear in Poetry, American Poetry Review and Poetry Ireland Review. Co-founder of Bookstock Literary Festival, he troubadours widely with the poetry/music group Los Lorcas
Honorable Mentions
Shaina Clingempeel, author of in the homes that house my history, is a Philadelphia-based poet and the owner of a small book editing business (Cypress Editorial) and literary magazine (Cypress Review).
Dayle Olson, author of From the Dead Letter Department, was a Northwest Voices guest writer at Lower Columbia College and winner of the Oregon Poetry Association’s first prize for prose in 2024.
Martha Brenckle, author of Inside a Snow Globe is Professor at the University of Central Florida in the Writing and Rhetoric Department and an affiliated faculty in Women and Gender Studies and Text and Technologies, a transdisciplinary PhD Program.
Jacqueline Jewell, author of Lady Arab, is a poet, college professor, EMMY Award-winning journalist, mother, and activist. A Philadelphia area native and proud daughter of an immigrant, Jacqueline uses her poetry to amplify underrepresented and discounted voices.
Host & Judge – Nathalie Anderson is a poet and librettist, who manages the lit-philly listserv for literary events in the Philadelphia area. She has recently retired from Swarthmore College, where she served as a Professor of English Literature, and directed the Program in Creative Writing

Live Poetry: Sarah Browning, W.D. Ehrhart, Jack Miller
2025-05-14 19:00 | Fergie’s Pub, 1214 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA, United States
Sarah Browning is the author of Call Me Yes, Killing Summer, and others, co-host of Wild Indigo Poetry, and teaches online with Writers in Progress. W. D. Ehrhart’s most recent books are Thank You for Your Service: Collected Poems; What We Can and Can’t Afford: Essays on Vietnam, Patriotism, and American Life, and At Smedley Butler’s Grave. Jack Miller, author of Habit: Seven Decades of Poems is a former English teacher who retired after a long career at Ocean City High School. Open Reading Follows

New Voices: Live at Parkway Central Library
2025-05-15 17:30 | Parkway Central Library, 1901 Vine St
New Voices: Spring 2025
A series for emerging poets between the ages of 10 and 25. A bi-annual publication which strives to bring together younger poets from various communities.
Join us as contributors read their poems
Thursday May 15th, 2025 – If you live near Philadelphia please join us live
LIVE at 5:30 EDT – Central Library, 1901 Vine St.

New Voices: Virtual Reading on Zoom
2025-05-17 14:00 | PA
New Voices: Spring 2025
A series for emerging poets between the ages of 10 and 25. A bi-annual publication which strives to bring together younger poets from various communities.
Join us as contributors read their poems
Saturday May 17th, 2025 – No matter where you live, please join us virtually
VIRTUAL at 2pm EDT on Zoom
