Moonstone Arts Center

Virtual Poetry Reading in Collaboration with Serotonin: Cynthia Arrieu-King, Roseline Mgbodichinma, Theresa Rodriguez, with Sean Lynch
2021-03-06 14:00 (America/New_York) | PA
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 Passcode: [REDACTED] Phone: 646 876 9923 US (New York)

Cynthia Arrieu-King teaches creative writing, literature, and general studies. Her poetry books include People are Tiny in Paintings of China, Manifest, and Futureless Languages. Her poetry book Continuity is forthcoming from Octopus Books and her book of experimental memoir The Betweens is forthcoming from Noemi in 2021.

Roseline Mgbodichinma is a Nigerian writer whose works have appeared or are forthcoming in The African writer Magazine, West Trestle Review, X-ray lit mag, JFA human rights mag, Artmosterrific & elsewhere. In 2018, she won the audience’s favorite award powered by Union Bank and Okadabooks for her short story, Silence That Spoke. Her poem, The Giant, was published in the Poets in Nigeria (PIN) 2019 Anthology, You can reach her on her blog at www.mgbodichi.com and Twitter @Rmgbodichinma.

Theresa Rodriguez is the author of three books of poetry: Jesus and Eros: Sonnets, Poems and Songs (Bardsinger Books, 2015), Longer Thoughts (Shanti Arts, 2020), and Sonnets, a collection of sixty-five sonnets (Shanti Arts, 2020). Her work has appeared in such journals as The Scarlet Leaf Review, The Wilderness House Literary Review, Spindrift, Mezzo Cammin, The Road Less Traveled, and the Society of Classical Poets Journal. Her website is http://www.bardsinger.com, where you can view videos of her performance poetry and find information about her books. Follow Theresa on Instagram and Twitter @thesonnetqueen.

Sean Lynch, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: 34th Street Poets
2021-03-07 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 Passcode: [REDACTED]
The 34th Street Poets, one of the longest-running poetry groups in the Philadelphia area (since 1992), meets weekly and currently comprises seven members: Alyson Shore Adler, Deidra Greenleaf Allan, Sandra L. Chaff, Barbara Daniels, Minna Duchovnay, B.E. Kahn, and Nina Schafer. The group includes poetry book and chapbook authors, a Montgomery County poet laureate, Leeway Foundation award winner, Pushcart Prize nominee, and recipients of grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts and NJ State Council on the Arts. Works by the group have appeared in numerous print and online journals including Adirondack Review, American Poetry Review, The Mid-American Review, Harrisburg Review, Passager, Poet Lore, and West Branch. The 34th Street Poets are currently based at the University of Pennsylvania’s Kelly Writers House.

Alyson Shore Adler has been writing poetry for the past 20 and has workshopped with and been mentored by many brilliant poets, including AV Christie and now Nat Anderson.

Sandra Chaff’s poetry has appeared in Poet Lore, Full Bleed, Unlocking the World: An Anthology of Found Poetry, among other publications. Her poetic subjects these days tend towards non-human sentient beings; philosophical musings on phenomena; and – no surprise here – mortality.

Barbara Daniels is author of Talk to the Lioness, Black Sails, Quinn & Marie, and Moon Kitchen. Her poetry has appeared in Cleaver, Faultline, and elsewhere, and she received four fellowships from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.

Minna Canton Duchovnay left business to study Latin and translates early 16th Century Renaissance Latin love poetry. Minna has been a featured reader in the Philadelphia area and has been published in Mad Poets Review, Premier, The Elixir, and the anthology, Embers and Flames among others.

B.E. Kahn, Pushcart Prize Nominee, recipient of both a PCA and CBE grant, among other awards. Her poems have appeared in Philadelphia Stories, Harrisburg Review, Mad Poets Review, Apiary and other journals. Author of 3 chapbooks, her book, Moon Writing to be published in 2022.

Deidra Greenleaf Allan has been published in American Poetry Review, Apiary, Haibun Today.com, Poetry Miscellany, and Puerto del Sol, among other journals. In 2001, she was selected as Montgomery County Poet Laureate and has received a Leeway Emerging Artist Award and been a finalist for a Pew Fellowship in poetry.

Nina Schafer is a member of the Lansdowne Poetry Workshop and the 34th Street Poets, and works with many poets at The Frost Place in New Hampshire every summer. She created The Unexpected Poetry Project through which she distributes (before the pandemic-induced hiatus) 12,000 poems a year, one-by-one, to unsuspecting people waiting in grocery store lines, at the gas station, in the elevator. The responses have been unexpected.

Virtual Poetry Reading: Mama Poets From Eastern Europe: Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach, Luisa Muradyan, Alina Stefanescu, with Larry Robin
2021-03-08 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85477352895?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 854 7735 2895 Passcode: [REDACTED]
Mama Poets From Eastern Europe, Celebrate International Women’s Day

Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach (www.juliakolchinskydasbach.com) is the author of three poetry collections: The Many Names for Mother, winner the Wick Poetry Prize (Kent State University Press, 2019) and finalist for the Jewish Book Award; Don’t Touch the Bones (Lost Horse Press, 2020), winner of the 2019 Idaho Poetry Prize; and 40 WEEKS, forthcoming from YesYes Books in 2023. Her recent poems appear in POETRY, American Poetry Review, and The Nation, among others. She holds an MFA from the University of Oregon and just defended her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. She lives in Philly with her two kids, two cats, one dog, and one husband. Books@https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1GblDW6X0ARL1NLSsHTYhNQ_FrUqIZax86fw1GXR9YoI/edit
Luisa Muradyan is originally from the Ukraine and holds a Ph.D. in Poetry from the University of Houston. She is the author of American Radiance and was the Editor-in-Chief of Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts from 2016-2018. She was also the recipient of the 2017 Prairie Schooner Book Prize and the 2016 Donald Barthelme Prize in Poetry. Additionally, Muradyan is a member of the Cheburashka Collective, a group of women and non-binary writers from the former Soviet Union. Previous poems have appeared in Poetry International, the Los Angeles Review, West Branch, Blackbird, and Ninth Letter among others.

Alina Stefanescu was born in Romania and lives in Birmingham, Alabama with her partner and several intense mammals. Recent books include a creative nonfiction chapbook, Ribald (Bull City Press Inch Series, Nov. 2020). Her poetry collection, dor, won the Wandering Aengus Press Prize and is forthcoming in July 2021. Alina’s writing can be found in diverse journals, including Prairie Schooner, North American Review, FLOCK, Southern Humanities Review, Crab Creek Review, World Literature Review, and others. She serves as Poetry Editor for Pidgeonholes, Poetry Editor for Random Sample Review, Poetry Reviewer for Up the Staircase Quarterly, and Co-Director of PEN America’s Birmingham Chapter. A finalist for the 2019 Kurt Brown AWP Prize, Alina won the 2019 River Heron Poetry Prize. She still can’t believe (or deserve) any of this. More online at www.alinastefanescuwriter.com.
Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follow

Virtual Poetry Reading: Lisa Alexander Baron, Rodger Lowenthal, Abbey J. Porter, with Larry Robin
2021-03-09 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81679636780?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 816 7963 6780 Passcode: [REDACTED]

Lisa Alexander Baron is the author of four poetry collections, including While She Poses, poems prompted by visual art. Her poems appear in Chautauqua, Confrontation, Fourth River, and Philadelphia Stories. She teaches writing and public speaking at two Philadelphia-area colleges. She hosts “Modern Plays Read Aloud” on Meetup, which offers Open Poetry and Monologue Readings for poets and actors.

Rodger Lowenthal’s new chapbook, fourteen, has just be released by the Moonstone Press. He has this to say:
“I started writing poetry when I was a freshman at Penn State. I had a pattern of finding a girlfriend and writing poetry, until we broke up. Then I started again with a new girlfriend.
I have been with my current “girlfriend” for 46 years, so lots of poetry.
Trivia: I have 5 grandchildren. More trivia: the historian Bernard Bailyn wrote about the “logic of rebellion.” Think about it.”

Abbey J. Porter writes poetry and memoir about people and relationships, life and loss. She holds an MFA in creative writing from Queens University of Charlotte, an MA in liberal studies from Villanova University, and a BA in English from Gettysburg College. Abbey works in communications and lives in Cheltenham, Pa., with her two beloved dogs—who help her remember to smile, particularly during these challenging times.

Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading in Collaboration with E-Verse Equinox Reading Series: Steven Kleinman, Warren C. Longmire, Christina Rosso, with John Wall Barger
2021-03-10 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 Passcode: [REDACTED]
Steven Kleinman is the author of Life Cycle of a Bear, winner of the 2019 Philip Levine Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in the American Poetry Review, the Gettysburg Review, Beloit Poetry Review, the Iowa Review, Oversound, American Literary Review, Tikkun, and elsewhere. He is the interim director of the University of the Arts BFA in creative writing, he is the faculty coordinator of the Art Alliance Writers’ Workshop, and a contributing editor at the American Poetry Review, where he co-hosts the podcast. Learn more at stevenkleinmanpoetry.com

Warren C Longmire is a writer, software engineer and educator from the bad part of North Philadelphia. His writing has been published in American Poetry Review, Eleven Eleven, The Painted Bride Quarterly. He is featured in the upcoming Best American Poetry anthology of 2021 and will be releasing his first full length collection through Radiator Press this year. He likes jazz, being black, video games and suffering. You can find his work and life on instagram at @alongmirewriter & @doubleyoulongmire respectively.

Christina Rosso lives and writes in South Philadelphia with her rescue pup, Atticus Finch, and bearded husband, Alex, where they run an independent bookstore and event space called A Novel Idea on Passyunk. She received an MFA in Creative Writing and MA in English from Arcadia University in 2016. Her debut chapbook, SHE IS A BEAST (APEP Publications), was released in May 2020. CREOLE CONJURE, her first full-length collection, is forthcoming from Maudlin House. Her fiction and nonfiction work centers around gender, sexuality, and fairy tales, and has been nominated for Best of the Net, Best Small Fictions, and the Pushcart Prize.

John Wall Barger, Host, Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: Love & the Pandemic
2021-03-14 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 Passcode: [REDACTED]

Love & the Pandemic
How are you coping?
Has isolation made you crazy?
Do you have a love life?
If you have a family – Are you fighting with your love ones?
If you are single – what have you done for the last year?
How do you survive?
69 Poets Respond
$15 – Not All Contributors Will Be Reading
Contributors in anthology include:
Fran Abrams
Carolyn Adams
Princess Ameenah
Barbara Arzt
John Balaban
Elisabeth Bass
Vincent Bell
Byron Beynon
Erica Blatt
Julia Blumenreich
Matilda Bray
R. Bremner
Lawrence Bridges
Joseph Chelius
Christine Chesire
Phebe Ciemny
Craig Czury
Pheralyn Dove
Runett Ebo
Cole Eubanks
Hugh Findlay
Eli Goldblatt
Linda Goss
Rebecca Hartz
Christine Higgins
Alan Hill
Brenda Hodges
Halsey Hyer
Suzan Jivan
Irving Jones
Bea Joyner
Chris Kaiser
David Kozinski
Kyle Laws
Michael Levin
Warren Longmire
Marjorie Maddox
Jim McDade
Kindra McDonald
Michael Miller
Drew Miller
Ryan Mimna
Marjorie Moorhead
Bonnie Neubauer
Gloria Nixon-John
Daniel O’Hara
Kaleigh O’Keefe
Stephen Page
Randall Potts
Gouri Prakash
Peter Prizel
David Radavich
Charles Rammelkamp
Paul Rousseau
George Schaefer
Jennifer Schneider
Katherine Shehadeh
Jacalyn Shelley
Bob Small
Ashley Stahmer
Richard Stimac
Lois Villemaire
Skyler Walker
Kelley White
Linda Whittenberg
Florence Woods
Han Yang
Brendan Yukins
Sarah Zale
Larry Robin, Host

Virtual Poetry Reading: Nathalie Anderson, Thomas Devaney, Mary Madec, with Larry Robin
2021-03-17 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 Passcode: [REDACTED]
Nathalie Anderson is a poet, librettist, and educator based in the Philadelphia suburbs. Her books of poetry include Following Fred Astaire, Crawlers, Quiver, Stain, and the chapbook Held and Firmly Bound. Her poems have appeared in such journals as Atlanta Review, DoubleTake, Natural Bridge, The New Yorker, Nimrod, and Plume; and she has authored libretti for five operas. She also manages the list-serv Lit-Philly. A 1993 Pew Fellow, she has taught for 39 years at Swarthmore College, where she serves as Alexander Griswold Cummins Professor in the Department of English Literature, and directs the Program in Creative Writing.

Thomas Devaney is a poet and educator based in Philadelphia. He wrote and co-director the film Bicentennial City with Green House Media (2020). Devaney is the author of Getting to Philadelphia, Hanging Loose Press (2019) and You Are the Battery, Black Square Editions (2019). His work is featured in Best American Poetry 2019 and he is 2014 Pew Fellow. He is on the Advisory Board of Blue Stoop: A Home for Philly Writers and he teaches at Haverford College.

Mary Madec’s most recent book The Egret Lands with News From Other Parts has been described by Medbh McGuckian as, “extraordinary, celebrating the, “crazy mystery of good agony,” in a solemn mixture of the banal and the prophetic; these are poems about poems and poets, birds and the bible, war and married life, children and childhood, insects and parents. Deeply rooted in Irish myth they explore female territories explicitly, culminating in moving dirges for the mother figure. She has a PhD, in Linguistics, from the University of Pennsylvania, a Master’s in Old English Poetry from NUI, Galway) and two other collection from Salmon Poetry In Other Words, 2010, and Demeter Does Not Remember 2014, She won the Hennessy XO Prize for Emerging Poetry in 2008.

Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: New Voices
2021-03-20 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 Passcode: [REDACTED]
The New Voices program consists of monthly readings by poets under the age of 25, plus a bi-annual publication. Moonstone’s objective is to expand your audience, introduce you to others who share your interest in poetry but are in different communities or go to different schools.

A Voice for Everyone
Listen, Share, Connect with Other Writers.
Open Reading Follows

Contributors in anthology include:
Isabel Acosta
Jared Alicea
Colby Bellman
Matilda Bray
Isabel Catalan
China Rain Chung
Cora Clark
Michaela Coll
Yves Marie Desir
Joanna Flynn
Stephanie Frank
L. J. Gallagher
Samuel Gunther
Lindsay Hargrave
Ryan Hiemenz
Nikole Hood
Marygrace Irvine
David Jones
Brianna Jones-Hollis
Alexandra Marino
Michaela Mazzeo
Isabella McIlvaine
Austin McLain
Shannon Montgomery
Jessica Moulder
Audrey Movsesian
Claire Petersen
Isabella Piacentino
Taleen Postian
Dani Radosh
Isabella Rice
Rachel Rosenblatt
Aimee Schwartz
Davi Schweizer
Vincent Sergiacomi
Madison Starinieri
Kelly Thompson
DuPree Walker
Han Yang

Virtual Poetry Reading: National Be Nasty Day & International Women's Day
2021-03-21 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 Passcode: [REDACTED]
March 8th is National Be Nasty Day and International Women’s Day.
It reminded me of an event we did 2017 when “Nasty Women Poets: An Unapologetic Anthology of Subversive Verse” edited by Grace Bauer & Julie Kane came out. It is an excellent anthology, and the event was lots of fun, as women responded to Donald Trump’s comment that Hillary Clinton was a Nasty Woman.
“Like beauty, “nasty” is in the eye of the beholder… The call for poems made it clear that we were looking for broader—and more varied—perspectives on women’s experience. Women poets have always been resisting, reclaiming, and reinventing—sometimes subtly, sometimes more overtly. To my mind, any refusal to allow others to define what it means to be a woman is a kind of resistance.” – Grace Bauer
Poets respond in this spirit, in the second year of the pandemic.
Contributors in anthology include:
Emily Batemon
Aja Beech
Wendy Blaxland
Eve Chilali
Minna Duchovnay
Suzanne Eaton
RUNETT EBO
Sophia Falco
Christine Ferrari Strickland
Hanoch guy
Rachel Haas-Gutin
Dolores Hayden
Emiliann Lorenzen
Jerri Ketcham McDermott
Emily Rose Miller
Liz Minette
Claire Nolan
Isabella Piacentino
Kate Potter
Susanna Rich
George Schaefer
Jennifer Schneider
Leanne Shirtliffe
Solana Warner
Kelley White
Linda Whittenberg
Samantha Wright

Virtual Poetry Reading: Kirwyn Sutherland, Sekai'afua Zankel, with Alina Macneal & Jennifer Hook
2021-03-24 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 Passcode: [REDACTED]
Kirwyn Sutherland is author of Jump Ship, a Clinical Research Professional and poet who makes poems centering the black experience in America. He is a Watering Hole fellow, has attended workshops/residencies at Cave Canem, Winter Tangerine, Poets House, Philadelphia Sculpture Gym, and Pearlstein Art Gallery, was a member of the 2015 Philadelphia Pigeon Slam Team and a member of the 2016 Philadelphia Fuze Poetry Slam Team. Kirwyn’s work has been published in American Poetry Review, Blueshift Journal, APIARY Magazine, FOLDER, The Wanderer and elsewhere. He has served as Editor of Lists/Book Reviewer for WusGood magazine and poetry editor for APIARY Magazine and currently teaching Spoken Word/Poetry Performance at the University of the Arts.

Sekai’afua Zankel, actor, writer, and poet, She is the author of Behind These Eyes/Optical Poems, and a winner of the Leeway Foundation, Art and Change Grant for her Poetry Play, Miss Pearl’s Spirit: In the Mysteries of Mirrors. Her poems have been published In the CAP literary magazine, “Poetry Ink”, several Anthologies, and in “Apiary”, 7 Power Issue. Sekai lives in Philadelphia with her husband, musician Bobby Zankel.

Alina Macneal & Jennifer Hook, Hosts – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: Remembering Lawrence Ferlinghetti
2021-03-28 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Remembering Lawrence Ferlinghetti
On February 22, 2021 Lawrence Ferlinghetti died at 101. In the 1950s, Ferlinghetti’s San Francisco bookstore, City Lights, was the center of the Beat Movement. Ferlinghetti published many of the writers whose goal was to “write in an authentic, unfettered style.” Ferlinghetti was arrested for obscenity for publishing Howl by Allen Ginsburg in 1956, but Judge Clayton Horn decided that the poem was of “redeeming social importance”.
Join us in remembering Ferlinghetti and the Beat Movement
“I have a personal connection with Ferlinghetti. While I never met him, he influenced my life. A Coney Island of the Mind (1958) was the first poetry book that reached me, at the age of 16 my friends and I sat around reading it aloud to each other. His fight against censorship also influenced me. When Tropic of Cancer was published by Grove Press in 1961, Robin’s Book Store was the test case in Pennsylvania. While Ferlinghetti won his case, we lost. Another Tropic of Cancer case made it to the Supreme Court which permitted sales in the United States.” – Larry Robin
Not All contributors Will Be Reading:
Joseph Bathanti
Joan Bauer
Ken Been
R. Bremner
Maryrose Carroll
Greg Colburn
Terry Dugan
Oliver Egger
Marie-Louise Eyres
Francis Flavin
Joan Huffman
Jones Irwin
Irving Jones
Chris Kaiser
Leonard Kress
Jim LaVilla-Havelin
Jim McDade
Richard Paul
Joan Penn
Kenneth Pobo
John Polier
Larry Robin
Ari Robinson
George Schaefer
Linda Simone
Bob Small
Diana Tenes
Kelley White
Samantha Wright
Robert Zaller

Virtual Poetry Reading: Five New Chapbooks from the Moonstone Press: Carey Hunter Davis, Peter F. Murphy, Leonard Neufeldt, Monika Wysong, Seki'afua Zankel, with Larry Robin
2021-03-31 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 Passcode: [REDACTED]
5 New Chapbooks from the Moonstone Press
Carey Hunter Davis began writing poetry as a day dreaming fourth grader once she realized words could enhance day dreaming. Her days are spent in writing and reading poetry. Recently dancingirlpress published a collection of her poems, “THE A POEMS.” Her work has also been published by the journals: Poeming Pidgeon, Echoes, Black Panda Press and the collections: Island of Geese and Stars, The Weird World Rolls On, Sarasvati Takes Pegasus As Her Mount, as well as other venues. It’s The Way We Live $10.00 (ISBN 978-1-946150-75-2) https://square.online/app/store/users/129102844/sites/541329794836208511/#/store/products/245

Peter F. Murphy grew up on the St. Lawrence River in Alexandria Bay, NY, the Heart of the Thousand Islands, where he learned to shoot pool and ice fish. His poems have appeared in the Birmingham Poetry Review, New Madrid, and The Café Review. His critical work includes three books on men and masculinity: Studs, Tools, and the Family Jewels: Metaphors Men Live By; Fictions of Masculinity; and Feminism and Masculinities. Maps of Three Continents, $10.00 (ISBN 978-1-94615077-6) https://moonstone-arts-center.square.site/product/murphy-peter-f-maps-of-three-continents/250?cs=true&cst=custom

Leonard Neufeldt “The philosopher George Santayana defined life as the fixation of significant points of interest in the flux of experience. In our interactions with our human world, certain moments in our relationships offer more than just a transient happening and a brush stroke of memory; they take on a kind of “life meaning” deeply implicated in our own lives. The poems focus on particular tensions and burdens of a strong interaction with the human community. Figures in Time, $10.00 (ISBN 978-1-946150-76-9) https://square.online/app/store/users/129102844/sites/541329794836208511/#/store/products/243

Monika Wysong is a Philadelphia based poet, playwright and psychotherapist. Her play, Laundromat, appeared on Philadelphia’s PBS station, and she has been a semi-finalist in the Louisville Actors’ Theater playwriting competition. Her poems have appeared in American Writing. “ Monika Wysong has given us poems of the body othered by trauma and reclaimed through identification with the natural world.” J .C. Todd, author of The Damages of Morning. Poems for The Rest of Us, $10.00 (ISBN 978-1-946150-78-3 https://moonstone-arts-center.square.site/product/wysong-monika-poems-for-the-rest-of-us/253?cs=true&cst=custom

Sekai’afua Zankel, actor, writer, and poet, She is the author of Behind These Eyes/Optical Poems, and a winner of the Leeway Foundation, Art and Change Grant for her Poetry Play, Miss Pearl’s Spirit: In the Mysteries of Mirrors. Her poems have been published In the CAP literary magazine, “Poetry Ink”, several Anthologies, and in “Apiary”, 7 Power Issue. Sekai lives in Philadelphia with her husband, musician Bobby Zankel. What I Heard, $10.00 (ISBN 978-946150-66-0) https://moonstone-arts-center.square.site/product/zankel-sekai-afua-what-i-heard/248?cs=true&cst=custom

Moonstone Poetry @PhillyCAM: The Spiritual in Poetry with Leonard Gontarek and Charles S. Carr
2021-04-06 18:30
Watch the live broadcast:
Comcast Cable 66/966HD/967 | Verizon FIOS 29/30 in Philadelphia | PhillyCAM TV:
https://phillycam.org/watch
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

Virtual Poetry Reading: Elizabeth Catanese, Darla Himeles, Ysabel Y. Gonzalez with Larry Robin
2021-04-07 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Elizabeth Catanese, Darla Himeles, and Ysabel Y. Gonzalez
Elizabeth Catanese is a writer and artist whose poems have appeared in The Pittsburgh Poetry Review, The Stillwater Review, OVS, Anomalous Press, Referential Magazine, and Calyx. Her most recent books include A Student’s Companion for How to Write Anything and STEAM Jobs You’ll Love: Architecture and Construction.

Darla Himeles is the author of Flesh Enough and Cleave. Her poems and essays have appeared in The Massachusetts Review, NAILED Magazine, Lesbians are Miracles, The Night Heron Barks, and Atticus Review. She is poetry editor for Platform Review and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and for Best of the Net.

Ysabel Y. Gonzalez is Assistant Director for the Poetry Program at the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, is a CantoMundo Fellow and has been published in Paterson Literary Review; Tinderbox Journal; Anomaly; and others. She is a Pushcart Prize nominee and the author of Wild Invocations.

Larry Robin, Host

Virtual Poetry Reading: Terry M. Dugan, Isabella Piacentino, Rob Wright, with Larry Robin
2021-04-09 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82768729107?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 827 6872 9107 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Terry M. Dugan, Isabella Piacentino, and Rob Wright
Terry M. Dugan writes poetry and prose about the collateral damage people suffer from wars, gun violence and the AIDS/addiction epidemic. Her work has appeared in Alimentum, Bellevue Literary Review, Womens’ Studies Quarterly, A&U Magazine, New Verse News, Inkwell and numerous anthologies including Poetry Ink, The Anthology of New England Poets and Fingernails Across the Chalkboard: Poetry and Prose on HIV/AIDS from the Black Diaspora. She has read at the United Nations, Hudson Valley Writers Center, Moonstone Arts Center, Hudson Valley Center for the Contemporary Arts, and Bowery Poetry Club, Bread and Roses Gallery, Fordham University, and on nytalkradio.net.

Isabella Piacentino is studying to be a high school English teacher at Temple. You can find her work in Moonstone Art Center’s New Voices #3 and Featured Poets Anthology, as well as in Hyphen (Temple’s Literary Magazine) and on the websites of Yikes Magazine, Anti-Herion, and Short Edition. When she is not writing, she is jamming out to her “middle school dance 2009-2013” playlist or (most likely) sifting through mountains of homework.

Rob Wright has now chosen to spend his time writing after working for three decades in film production, He currently serves as associate fiction editor for Able Muse, and has been awarded three Fellowships in Literature from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. He has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and has published fiction, reviews, and poetry in Able Muse, Angle, Big City Lit, the Evansville Review, Measure, Rattle, String Poet, and the Schuylkill Valley Journal. A finalist for the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award, he recently was awarded the Frost Farm Prize for Metrical Poetry and was honored to give a reading at the home of Frost in Derry, New Hampshire.
Larry Robin, Host, Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: New Voices - Emerging Poets, Isabel Acosta, David Jones, Han Yang, with Larry Robin
2021-04-10 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: New Voices – Emerging Poets, Isabel Acosta, David Jones, and Han Yang
New Voices is a program designed for emerging poets under the age of 25.
Isabel Acosta is a twenty-year-old aspiring poet who hopes to one day touch the hearts of many through her writing. After being born and raised in a small town in West Texas, she currently resides in Pennsylvania where she is studying English and Communications at Rosemont College. Some of her favorite poems include “Song of Myself” by Walt Whitman, “A Glimpse” by Walt Whitman, and “Annabel Lee” by Edgar Allan Poe. From poems about love to social justice, Acosta strives to show her audience that feeling emotion and wanting to be heard in the world is important. She states that even if her writing were to change one person’s life, she knows that she achieved her goal.
David Jones is a Philadelphia native, and former Youth Poet Laureate for the City of Philadelphia (2015-16). His work has appeared in Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice published by Michigan State University Press. David loves mangoes and Hip-Hop. He writes with the intent to heal and believes that poetry is an art form that goes far beyond the written word.

Han Yang is a senior biology student at Haverford College who brings a refreshing take on poetry through her scientific background. Her poetry takes an experimental tone and is interwoven with bold imagery and lucid contemplations. Her experiences with English as a second language and as an outsider to the traditional world of poetry have both shaped and liberated her style. Her most recent work was published in Milkweed, Haverford College’s literary magazine. Outside of poetry, Han also enjoys writing personal reflection and other nonfiction pieces.

Larry Robin, Host. Open Reading Follows.

Virtual Poetry Reading: Moonstone International - From France in Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia: Jamika Ajalon, Malik Ameer Crumpler, Nina Zivancevic, with Aaren Perry & Sonia Robin
2021-04-11 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Moonstone International – From France in Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia
Jamika Ajalon is the author of “Take back the Narrative” and a novel “SKY PAPERS” coming out via The Feminist Press in NY in June. Ajalon is also a musician whose latest album is “rebooted” with Jamika & the Argonauts and will be released this year. Jamika is also known for her insightful filmmaking. Her latest film to do the circuits is “Coffee Pot” 2020. She has written many academic texts on Afro futurism, Narrative, and Memory. Her web page is: www.jamikaajalon.com.

Malik Ameer Crumpler is a poet, rapper, composer, editor, producer, P.R. Writer & teacher that’s been involved in over fifty albums, several glitch art films, six poetry books & one book of raps, Beneath The Underground. He’s the co-poetry editor/co-host with Paris Lit Up, editor-at-large of The Opiate, curator for Poets Live & co-founder of Those That This. He currently lives in Paris, France. “The Rest Is Now (a poetry EP)” published with The Isolation Collection Anthology is Malik’s most recent Poetry offering which he toured throughout France, England, Amsterdam, and Washington D.C. thanks to a generous grant from Washington D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities 2020..

Nina Zivancevic’s new book of poetry, ROLLERSKATING NOTES will be published by Cool Grove Press in New York in September of 2021. Her first book was published in 1982. In the two preceding years she worked as a secretary and assistant to Allen Ginsberg. Zivancevic, Serbian born poet, author, critic and correspondent has published more than twenty books – poetry and prose – and has translated numerous works into Serbian. A PhD in Comparative Literature and Slavic Studies, she taught English Language and Literature at the Sorbonne and other European universities. Zivancevic, currently living in Paris, has received three awards and a grant for her outstanding literary achievements.

Aaren Perry & Sonia Robin, Hosts – In Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia

Alliance Française de Philadelphie
1420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102

Virtual Poetry Reading: Miriam N. Kotzin, Michelle Taransky, Kevin Varrone, with Larry Robin
2021-04-14 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Miriam N. Kotzin, Michelle Taransky, and Kevin Varrone
Miriam N. Kotzin is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently, Debris Field and The Body’s Bride. Her poetry and fiction have been published in anthologies and in journals including Shenandoah, Boulevard, SmokeLong Quarterly, Eclectica,

Michelle Taransky is author of Sorry Was In The Woods, and Barn Burned, Then, winner of the Omnidawn Poetry and Abramowitz-Goldberg. Taransky directs the reading series at Kelly Writers House, work as Reviews Editor for the poetics journal Jacket2, and appear as a regular guest on the popular poetry podcast series, PoemTalk.

Kevin Varrone has worked for over 10 years on a multiple-book project entitled g-point Almanac. Eephus, is the fourth book in the project, written in a style that Varrone describes as “research lyric,” synthesizing historical anecdotes, slowly unfolding narratives, and language experimentation.

Larry Robin, Host, Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: National Haiku Poetry Day Anthology
2021-04-17 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: National Haiku Poetry Day Anthology
Observed annually on April 17, National Haiku Poetry Day encourages all to try their hand in creativity. Haiku poetry is a form of Japanese poetry that is non-rhyming and usually consists of 3 lines with a syllable pattern of 5-7-5. Usually, an element of nature, a season, moment of beauty, or an individual experience inspires haiku poems. Sensory language is used to capture a feeling, image or moment.
As one of the world’s oldest and most regularly used forms of poetry, many poets wrote many haiku. While the most well-known is Matsuo Basho, others we may recognize are William Blake, T.S. Eliot, Richard Wright and Maya Angelou. Try capturing an entire moment or emotion in 17 syllables and getting it right. English haiku does not always follow the strict syllable count found in Japanese haiku
Join us as the contributors to Moonstone’s Haiku Poetry Day Anthology read their work.
Not all contributors will be reading:
Fran Abrams
Carolyn Adams
Sandra Anfang
Fran Baird
Sunday Banks
Eben Bein
Miriam Ben-Yoseph
Willeena Booker
Sam Boone
Elizabeth Boquet
Chris Bray
Matilda Bray
Jill Bronfman
Grace Cavalieri
Eulinda A.
Clarke-Akalanne
J.J. Cole
Ava Compagnoni
Damien Cooper
Susan Cummings
John Davis
John DeBruicker
Kathryn Devlin
Elinor Donahue
Donatella du Plessis
Philip Dykhouse
Alfred Encarnacion
Cole Eubanks
Katherine Falk
Hugh Findlay
Philip Foster
Harvey Gardner
Valerie Gay
Linda goss
Paz Griot
Beejay Grob
Hanoch guy
Dagmar Holl
Judit Hollos
Joan Huffman
Maria James-Thiaw
Nageena Johnson
Irving Jones
Chris Kaiser
Sarah Karowski
Carl Kaucher J
ames Ph. Kotsybar
Ed Krizek
Resolute Lee
Frederick Lowe
Sean Lynch
Warren Longmire
Deirdre Maher
James Mancinelli
Linda Martin
Elinor mattern
Helen Mazarakis
Christina McIntire
Andrew McLean
Ann Michael
Drew Miller
David Mook
Christopher Moore
Mr. Mosolino
Leonard Niedermayer
Gloria Nixon-John
Diane Oesau
Ken Olson
Hermond Palmer
Joan Penn
Victoria Peurifoy
Kate Potter
Elijah Pringle
Larry Robin
Sonia Sanchez
George Schaefer
Jennifer Schneider
Naila Schulte
Fereshteh Sholevar
John Sime
Linda Simone
Noel Sloboda
Bob Small
Andrew Sorokowski
Lamont B. Steptoe
Carole stone
Sherry Stratton
Renee Szostek
Therese Taha
Catherine Trapani
Sarah J. Trembath
Sandra Turner-Barnes
Lois Villemaire
Sharon Wellons
Kelley White
Carol Williams
Shay Wills
Nellie Wong
Samantha Wright
Daniel Zehner
Larry Robin, Host. Open Reading Follows.

Virtual Poetry Reading: Moonstone International - From France in Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia: Sojourner Ahebee, Lisette Lombré, Mathias Malzieu, Daria Nelson, Jacques Perry Salkow, Suzanne Rault-Balet, with Aaren Perry & Sonia Robin
2021-04-18 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Moonstone International – From France in Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia
Sojourner Ahebee was born in Cote d’Ivoire to an American mother and Ivoirien father, Sojourner Ahebee writes stories about African diaspora identities and the eternal question of home and belonging. Her poems have been published in The Atlantic, Muzzle Magazine, For Harriet, Apiary Magazine and elsewhere. In 2013 she served as a National Student Poet, the nation’s highest honor for young poets presenting original work and was invited to the White House to garner her award. A graduate of Stanford University, she is a recipient of the MacDowell Fellowship, and author of Reporting from the Belly of the Night. Sojourner Ahebee est née en Côte d’Ivoire, d’une mère américaine et un père ivoirien. Elle écrit sur des sujets tels que les identités de la diaspora africaine ou encore la question d’appartenance. Ses poèmes ont été publiés dans le journal The Atlantic, les magazines Muzzle, For Harriet, Winter Tangerine Review, Apiary, et bien d’autres. En 2013, elle reçoit la plus haute distinction pour des jeunes poètes présentant un travail original: Le National Student Poet. Michelle Obama, alors première Dame des Etats Unis, l’a reçue à la maison Blanche cette même année pour lui remettre sa décoration. Elle est diplômée de l’Université de Stanford où elle a passé 4 ans à étudier le programme d’études africaines et afro-américaines. Son premier recueil de poésies, Reporting from the Belly of the Night

Lisette Lombé is Belgium and Congolese, a renowned figure of the slam scene in Belgium, she defends all minorities with passion. For her activism, she was awarded the distinction of citizen of honor of the city of Liège. Antiracists, feminists, queers, politicals, her poems are a vital need to denounce violence and injustices. Lisette Lombe also expresses herself through collages reflecting the turning points in the movements for rights for Black Americans. Photo credits: © Ed Alcock. Lisette Lombré née en 1978, est belgo-congolaise. Grande figure de la scène slam en Belgique, elle défend avec rage toutes les minorités. Elle a été nommée citoyenne d’honneur de la ville de Liège pour son activisme. Elle est l’autrice de Black words et Venus poetica (L’Arbre à paroles). Antiracistes, féministes, queers, politiques, les mots de Lisette Lombé font battre le pavé et le cœur du lecteur. Écrire est un besoin vital pour dénoncer les violences, les injustices, les crimes impunis, avec toujours la scène comme terrain d’exploration : le slam est conçu pour être dit, l’écriture rythmée, intense et expressive. Lisette Lombé s’exprime aussi à l’aide de collages, rappelant les grandes heures des combats pour les droits civiques des Noirs américains (Angela Davis, Martin Luther King…).

Mathias Malzieu started his poetic career in 1993, when he founded the rock band Dionysos. Ever since, his poetic world is shaped in books, records and movies. After two books translated in more than 20 countries and read by more than a million people, LE DÉRÈGLEMENT JOYEUX DE LA MÉTRIQUE AMOUREUSE is his first poetry book. Daria Nelson is a multidisciplinary artist. Born in Ukraine, she has been living in France since 2016. She was finalist at the Picto de la Jeune Photographie de Monde (Fashion Photography Awards) in 2016. Photo credits: © Ed Alcoc. Mathias Malzieu entame sa carrière d’homme poétique en 1993 en fondant le groupe de rock Dionysos. Depuis, il développe son univers sous forme de livres, de disques, de films. Après La Mécanique du cœur et Journal d’un vampire en pyjama, traduits dans plus de vingts pays et qui ont touché plus d’un million de lecteurs, LE DÉRÈGLEMENT JOYEUX DE LA MÉTRIQUE AMOUREUSE est son premier recueil de poèmes. Daria Nelson est une artiste plasticienne et photographe née en Ukraine. Elle vit en France depuis 2016. Elle a été finaliste du prix Picto de la Jeune Photographie de Mode en 2016.

Jacques Perry Salkow has two loves: music and words. Graduated from the Dick Grove School of music in Los Angeles (piano), he is also the author of many impish books, including: Les Dessous des mots d’amour, avec Frédéric Schmitter (Points-Seuil, 2010) ; Anagrammes renversantes ou le Sens caché du monde, avec Étienne Klein (Flammarion, 2011) ; Anagrammes à quatre mains, avec Karol Beffa (Actes Sud, 2018) ; Sorel Éros. Palindrome, avec Frédéric Schmitter (Rivages, 2020) ; Anagrammes dans le boudoir, avec Laurence Castelain (Actes Sud, 2020). He lives in Touraine, France. Jacques Perry-Salkow a deux amours, les notes et les mots. Pianiste de jazz diplômé de la Dick Grove School of Music de Los Angeles, il est aussi l’auteur de plusieurs livres malicieux dont Les Dessous des mots d’amour, avec Frédéric Schmitter (Points-Seuil, 2010) ; Anagrammes renversantes ou le Sens caché du monde, avec Étienne Klein (Flammarion, 2011) ; Anagrammes à quatre mains, avec Karol Beffa (Actes Sud, 2018) ; Sorel Éros. Palindrome, avec Frédéric Schmitter (Rivages, 2020) ; Anagrammes dans le boudoir, avec Laurence Castelain (Actes Sud, 2020). Il vit en Touraine. Photo credits © Natacha Giraldo.

Suzanne Rault-Balet is a french artist born in 1993. Author, performer, photographer, she has made her free and wandering way of life a main source of inspiration. Going back and forth with long poems and mesmerizing punchlines – which she also shares and sings on stage – Suzanne Rault-Balet questions her time, moves the lines of emotions, bodies and desires in an uncompromising style and draws up a sensitive and raw portrait of ultra-modern loneliness. Photo credits: © Ed Alcock. Suzanne Rault-Balet est une artiste Française née en 1993. Auteure, comédienne, photographe, elle a fait de l’errance son mode de vie et la source de son inspiration. Par une écriture libre et sans concession, alternant poèmes au long cours et punchlines troublantes, qu’elle interprète et chante désormais sur scène, Suzanne Rault-Balet interpelle son époque, bouscule et interroge les corps, les coeurs, les désirs et dresse un portrait sensible et cru de l’ultra-moderne solitude.

Aaren Perry & Sonia Robin, Hosts – In Association with Alliance Française de Philadelphia

Alliance Française de Philadelphie
1420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102

Virtual Poetry Reading: Ryan Eckes, Jake Syersak, Robert Zaller, with Larry Robin
2021-04-21 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Ryan Eckes, Jake Syersak, and Robert Zaller
Ryan Eckes is a poet from Philadelphia. His most recent books, Wet Money, Fine Nothing and General Motors, are available free online. Eckes has worked as an adjunct professor and labor organizer in education, and he co-edits Radiator Press.

Jake Syersak is a poet, translator, and editor living in Seattle, WA. He is the author of the recent poetry chapbook Vortex(t) (CoastNoCoast, 2020) and the full-length poetry collection Yield Architecture (Burnside Review Press, 2018). In 2021, Trembling Pillow Press will publish his newest full-length poetry collection, Mantic Compost. He is also the translator of several collections of poetry by Moroccan author Mohammed Khaïr-Eddine, including Proximal Morocco— (Ugly Duckling Presse, forthcoming 2023) and Resurrection of Wild Flowers (Oomph! Press, forthcoming 2021). With Pierre Joris, he co-translated Khaïr-Eddine’s hybrid novel, Agadir (Lavender Ink/Diálogos Press, 2020). He and Paul Cunningham currently co-edit Radioactive Cloud, a micro-press.

Robert Zaller, historian, critic, poet, and playwright, is Drexel Distinguished University Professor of History Emeritus. A scholar of Robinson Jeffers and of British constitutional history, his work includes seven books and chapbooks of poetry, most recently Speaking to Power and The Dresden Zoo. He is also the translator of the work of his late wife, Lili Bita, and with her of the Greek poet Nikiforos Vrettakos. His honors include a Guggenheim fellowship, and he is an elected fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He lives in Bala Cynwyd.

Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading in Collaboration with Serotonin: Kristin Garth, Susan Triemert, Lucy Zhang, with Sean Lynch
2021-04-24 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading in Collaboration with Serotonin: Kristin Garth, Susan Triemert, and Lucy Zhang
Check out Serotonin Poetry @ serotoninpoetry.org
Kristin Garth is a Pushcart, Rhysling nominated sonneteer and a Best of the Net 2020 finalist. Her sonnets have stalked journals like Glass, Yes, Five:2:One, Luna Luna and more. She is the author of 20 books of poetry including Candy Cigarette Womanchild Noir (Hedgehog Poetry Press), Flutter Southern Gothic Fever Dream (TwistiT Press), and Girlarium (Fahmidan Journal). She is the founder of Pink Plastic House a tiny journal and co-founder of Performance Anxiety, an online poetry reading series. Follow her on Twitter: (@lolaandjolie) and her website kristingarth.com

Susan Triemert holds an MA in Education and an MFA from Hamline University in St. Paul, MN. Her essays, stories and poems have been published or forthcoming in various print and online journals, most recently North Dakota Quarterly, Gone Lawn, Boston Literary Magazine, and Ghost Parachute. She lives in St. Paul with her family, most of whom have fur. You can find her on Twitter at @SusanTriemert

Lucy Zhang writes, codes, and watches anime. Her work has appeared in Lost Balloon, New Delta Review, EX/POST, Jet Fuel Review, Third Point Press, and elsewhere. She is an editor for Heavy Feather Review and assistant fiction editor for Pithead Chapel. Find her at https://kowaretasekai.wordpress.com/ or on Twitter @Dango_Ramen.

Sean Lynch, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: Catherine Bancroft, David Kertis, with Alina Macneal & Jennifer Hook
2021-04-28 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Catherine Bancroft and David Kertis
Catherine Bancroft writes poetry, makes art, and sometimes combines them. She has read her poetry at Green Line Café, PAFA, Blue Marble Bookstore, Fergie’s Pub, and other local spots. Her visual art has appeared at Muse Gallery, 3rd Street Gallery, St Asaph’s Gallery, DaVinci Art Alliance, among others, and in one-woman shows at the Fackenthal-Pethick Gallery at the Baldwin School, and FireWorks Gallery in Camden. Her current “Ellis Island Series,” in conte crayon and acrylic, was inspired by photographs of early 20th century immigrants. Two Scottish Girls from her Ellis Island Series recently won Best Painting at Main Line Art Center’s 2020 Members Exhibition. Earlier in her life she taught English to high school and college students, and wrote book reviews for The Philadelphia Inquirer, the New York Times, and Ms. Magazine. She is the co-author of two children’s books, including “Felix’s Hat.”
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 online in Frigate and Apiary and given a number of readings in the Philadelphia area. His book, Word of the Day, has recently been published.
Alina Macneal & Jennifer Hook, Hosts – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: International Jazz Day: aTONEment - Jazz Inspired Fables from Improvising Lives with John Lavin and Elijah Pringle
2021-04-30 20:30
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87964733385?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 879 6473 3385 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: International Jazz Day: aTONEment – Jazz Inspired Fables from Improvising Lives
A cross-genre poetry series melding musicians who play the notes with poets who take note!
This spotlight on Philly’s Art of Improvisation will witness Moonstone poet, Raheem Curry trading solos with singer and composer extraordinaire, Ella Gahnt. Also collaborating are jazz violinist, Derek Washington, and co-hosts: jazz percussionist, John Lavin and poet, Elijah B Pringle, III.

John Lavin & Elijah B. Pringle, III – Hosts
Want to hear more about what this event entails? Listen to the fifth episode in our podcast series where three interns talk to the hosts of this event, John Lavin and Elijah B. Pringle, to learn more!

Virtual Poetry Reading: International Workers' Day Anthology
2021-05-01 13:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: International Workers’ Day Anthology

May 1st is International Workers’ Day, a time of celebration and opposition throughout the world, except in the United States where it began. May Day commemorates the May 1st, 1886 nationwide protest for the eight-hour day and the following “Haymarket Affair,” a pivotal event in the history of workers’ and anarchist movements in which four labor organizers were hanged by the State in Chicago. May Day is also the ancient celebration of Spring and rebirth – the traditional time for planting new seeds in old ground.
Poets have long reflected on work. What is it to you? Is it a burden, a salve, a joy?
Donald Hall wrote a wonderful memoir called Life Work, not what you do for money but what you do with your life. The Poetry Foundation has a terrific article, Work Poems – Poetry about looking for jobs and working for a living. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69799/work-poems.
Read What Work Is by Philip Levine; Brass Spittoons by Langston Hughes; Shirt by Robert Pinsky.
We asked poets to send us a poem on work for a Moonstone anthology.
Join us as we celebrate International Workers Day with poetry and bring a poem.
Contributors (Not all will be reading):
Michele Belluomini
Miriam Ben-Yoseph
Byron Beynon
Sarah Bowden
Matilda Bray
R. Bremner
Grace Cavalieri
Terence Culleton
Steven Davison
Terry Dugan
Christine Ferrari
Strickland
Maria Gillan
linda goss
Beejay Grob
Steven Halpern
Barbara Hobbie
Joan Huffman
jack israel
Irving Jones
Chris Kaiser
Michael Levin
Karen Mandell
Emily Rose Miller
Liz Minette
Dennis Moritz
Anthony Palma
John Polier
David Radavich
Esther Ramos
joe roarty
George Schaefer
Jennifer Schneider
Bob Small
Sarah Trembath
Kelley White
Samantha Wright

Virtual Poetry Reading: Medicine Poetry - John Fox, Sean Lynch, Elizabeth Gordon McKim, with Aaren Perry
2021-05-02 16:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84532069956?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 845 3206 9956 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Medicine Poetry – John Fox, Sean Lynch, Elizabeth Gordon McKim
John Fox, founder of The Institute for Poetic Medicine, began work with poetry & healing in 1981, he is the author of Finding What You Didn’t Lose: Expressing Your Truth and Creativity Through Poem-Making and Poetic Medicine: The Healing Art of Poem-Making. In 2012 he started a training program for people to learn the art and practice of poetry-as-healer. His work has made a significant impact on professionals in medicine, psychology, education, pastoral care, Veterans, cancer support, hospice, drug and alcohol counseling, immigrant and refugee concerns and elder care. John taught poetry therapy for many years within the Expressive Therapy Department at the California Institute for Integral Studies, The Institute for Transpersonal Psychology/Sofia University and within the Arts & Consciousness Department at John F. Kennedy University.
Sean Lynch, he/him, is a poet and editor who lives in South Philadelphia. His poems have appeared in journals including Hobart, Meow Meow Pow Pow, and Drunk Monkeys. He’s on the editorial board of Moonstone Arts Center and serves as the Program Director of the Nick Virgilio Haiku Association. His Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor of choice is Citalopram.

Elizabeth Gordon McKim’s latest book is Lovers In The Free Fall. The Jazz Poet of Lynn and poet laureate of the European School, she offers the reader rich and diverse forms and shapes. Spoken word artist, editor, and teacher, she is the author of eight collections of poetry, and one teaching guide Beyond Words co-authored with Judith Steinbergh poet laureate of Brookline. McKim is a pioneer member of the Arts Institute for Expressive Therapy at Lesley University since 1974 under the direction of Shaun McNiff. She has read and performed her poetry in countless venues, locally and abroad. She loves to work improvisationally with musicians, dancers, visual artists, and she teaches from a multi-arts trans-cultural perspective.

Aaren Perry, Host – Open Reading Follows

Moonstone Poetry @ PhillyCAM: Tom Garvey with Charles S. Carr
2021-05-04 18:30
2021 Philly Loves Poetry Interview and Readings Series: Charles S. Carr talks with Tom Garvey, Author of The Secret Apartment: Vet Stadium, a surreal memoir
Watch the live broadcast at Comcast Cable 66/966HD/967 | Verizon FIOS 29/30 in Philadelphia | PhillyCAM TV: https://phillycam.org/watch
Tom Garvey, an Airborne, Ranger and Special Forces qualified officer, served as an A-Team Leader in Viet Nam in 1968 and returned home to mixed reviews about his stability and state of mind. Like many other Viet Nam Veterans, he found few who cared to hear about his time overseas. Now, with his wife Peggy and his wonderful family of five step children and their mates and two world class grandchild, he has finally come home. Life is good. Life is very good indeed.

If I overheard anyone telling this story in a bar or at a party, I wouldn’t believe it either. But I must confess, I’d probably “scooch” a little closer, eavesdropping, unable to walk away. I’d have to find out how this yarn unraveled. Let’s begin an implausible story with a seemingly simple yet complex question. If you were single, never married with no children or dependents, would you, if you had the opportunity, have lived “on the down low” in a secret apartment in Veterans Stadium? In this proposal we have an off the wall South Philly version of “The Phantom of the Opera,” but the larger notion this question begs could easily challenge the inner demons of sports fans anywhere. If you had an opportunity to live in a major sports stadium of a team you grew up loving, what would you have done? In my case: I could, so I did.

“Truth, always strange, is stranger than fiction.”~ Lord Byron
Charles S. Carr, Host

Virtual Poetry Reading: Quintin Collins, Meg Kearney, Iain Haley Pollock, with Larry Robin
2021-05-05 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Quintin Collins, Meg Kearney, Iain Haley Pollock
Quintin Collins (he/him) is a writer, editor, and Solstice MFA Program assistant director. His work appears in many print and online publications, and his first full-length collection of poems is The Dandelion Speaks of Survival (Cherry Castle Publishing, 2021). His second collection of poems, Claim Tickets for Stolen People, selected by Marcus Jackson as winner of The Journal’s 2020 Charles B. Wheeler Prize, is forthcoming from The Ohio State University Press/Mad Creek Books in 2022. See more of his work on qcollinswriter.com.

Meg Kearney’s All Morning the Crows, winner of the Washington Prize, is just out with The Word Works press. Meg is also author of An Unkindness of Ravens and Home By Now, winner of the PEN New England L.L. Winship Award; a heroic crown, The Ice Storm, published as a chapbook in 2020; and three verse novels for teens. Her award-winning picture book, Trouper, is illustrated by E.B. Lewis. Meg’s poetry has been featured on Garrison Keillor’s “A Writer’s Almanac” and Ted Kooser’s “American Life in Poetry” series, and included in the 2017 Best American Poetry anthology (Natasha Tretheway, guest editor). She lives in New Hampshire and directs the Solstice MFA in Creative Writing Program in Massachusetts. Visit www.megkearney.com.
Iain Haley Pollock is the author of two poetry collections, Ghost, Like a Place (Alice James Books, 2018), which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award, and Spit Back a Boy, winner of the 2010 Cave Canem Poetry Prize. Individual poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, The Baffler, and The New York Times Magazine. Pollock teaches English at Rye Country Day School in Rye, NY, and is a member of the poetry faculty at the Solstice MFA program of Pine Manor College.

Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: Regie Cabico, Israel Colon, Lucia Herrmann, with Sean Hanrahan
2021-05-12 19:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84308329737?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 843 0832 9737 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: Regie Cabico, Israel Colon, Lucia Herrmann
Regie Cabico is the first Asian American and queer poet to win the Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. He has appeared on HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, TEDx Talk and NPR’s Snap Judgement. He received a New York Innovative Theater Award for his work with the New York Neo-Futurists’ Production of Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind. He produces Capturing Fire Festival and Press. He has been on faculty at Kundiman, Banff Spoken Word Arts & NYU’s Asian Pacific Studies Artist in Residence. Cabico is a founding Board Member of Split This Rock and a 2019 Le Maison Baldwin Fellowship Recipient.

Israel Colon, author of Icarus ($12.00, Toho Publishing) With inspired rhyme schemes and use of poetic forms, Icarus confronts Israel Colon’s struggles with trauma, religion, and relationships. Through a mercilessly honest approach to writing, Colon shines a light on the experiences of a man barely keeping it together. A Philadelphia-based father, poet, and business operations professional, Colon has a bachelor’s from Temple University and a master’s in industrial and organizational psychology from The Chicago School of Professional Psychology. His debut poetry chapbook chronicles his early life as an at-risk youth. “Icarus will send shivers down your spine. It will remind you of the power of poetry and leave you wanting to read it again.”? Andrs Cruciani, author of The Father and editor-in-chief of Toho Journal.

Lucia Herrmann is a Miami-raised and Philly-based artist and educator. She has been published by Apiary, Toho Journal, Defunkt Mag, and has two pieces forthcoming in Jai-Alai Books’ Waterproof collection. In 2019, Lucia was featured in two Philly FringeArts productions, and she is very much looking forward to when theaters and performance spaces can safely reopen. She is a workshop leader for Green Street Poetry, and a former poetry editor for Toho Journal. In the classroom and in her community, Lucia is dedicated to the transformative and unifying power of creative expression.

Sean Hanrahan, Host – Open Reading Follows

Virtual Poetry Reading: New Voices - Emerging Poets, Siduri Beckman, Kelly Thompson, DuPree Walker, with Larry Robin
2021-05-15 14:00
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82855093815?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 828 5509 3815 – Passcode: [REDACTED]
Virtual Poetry Reading: New Voices – Emerging Poets, Siduri Beckman, Kelly Thompson, and DuPree Walker
New Voices is a program designed for emerging poets under the age of 25.
Siduri Beckman is a lifelong Philadelphian. She served as the inaugural Youth Poet Laureate of Philadelphia where she was mentored by Poet Laureate Sonia Sanchez. She was published most recently in MSU Press’s 2019 collection, Undocumented: Great Lakes Poet Laureates on Social Justice. Siduri is passionate about the intersection of poetry, public education, and civic engagement. Siduri graduated from Yale University in 2020.

Kelly Thompson is a 23-year-old recent Temple graduate from Limerick, Pennsylvania. She loves writing fiction and poetry with fantasy and horror elements. You can find her poetry in Moonstone’s New Voices Anthology #4 and in the online journal Ariadne.

DuPree Walker is a graduating senior International Affairs, Spanish double major, English minor, from Anchorage, Alaska, pursuing her degree at Howard University. For as long as she can remember her creative side has been drawn to the art of language. This year, Moonstone Arts Center gave DuPree the amazing first opportunity to be a published poet. After graduation, DuPree plans on pursuing law school with the goal to practice international litigation and arbitration whilst also fostering her creative passion DuPree is also a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.

Larry Robin, Host – Open Reading Follows
