55 poetry presenters on 16 panels over 3 days: 2014 Schedule

I was so busy organizing and attending the Poetry Studies & Creative Poetry sessions at the PCA/ACA Conference in Chicago mid-April that I never posted about it on here. It was fantastic! I fully intended to see more of the city and to take naps while I was on this conference trip, but I couldn’t tear myself away from the poetry panels. I was so impressed with the presentations: readings and performances of original poems, paper presentations, discussions about teaching and community involvement, and more. One of the extra special highlights was getting away from the conference hotel for an off-site poetry event: we saw Kate Gale and Nicelle Davis read at the Seminary Co-Op Bookstore, followed by a delicious dinner at The Nile Restaurant. I loved getting to know some new poet-friends and getting to visit with some already dear ones.

I look forward to helping poets further infiltrate the Popular Culture Association / American Culture Association Conference in New Orleans next year…

I had a wonderful time reading tonight at The Studio Theatre by Universal Studios. My fellow readers were fantastic: Karen Kevorkian, who teaches at UCLA,  and Hugh Martin, who is an Iraq vet and a Stegner Fellow. It’s not often that I come home from a poetry reading with a book by each of the other readers, but I sure did this time!

As for my work, I read a few poems from each chapbook. They seemed to go over well; the audience laughed heartily in all the right places and occasionally talked back between poems. 🙂 I love interactive audiences. They bought a few of my books too.

Thanks, Alex M. Frankel for running this series and inviting me to participate. Thanks also to Tarumi for the wonderful affirmation and for buying a copy of each of my books.

I had such a wonderful time as the guest poet for PLNU’s annual Poetry Day! Here’s a photo taken by Carol Blessing during the Q&A at the evening reading.

Thanks Carol Blessing, Edie Chapman, and Linda Beail for inviting me and planning all of the events during the day (and some on the next day too!) I was so impressed with the turn out for the afternoon literary tea and the evening reading, and I loved meeting so many engaged and insightful students.

I told my husband before I went to the festival this evening that I wasn’t expecting many people to stick around for my poetry reading. I figured I’d have a colleague or two there to support me, but I assumed that everyone who came to see Aimee Bender read would take off after she finished. I was very wrong.

Not only were there 20-30 people present (as far as I know… I was terrible at those contests in elementary school in which we had to guess how many jelly beans were in a jar), but Aimee Bender actually stayed for my reading! I was so thrilled. I read poems that respond to familiar stories: fairy tales, novels, biblical narratives. Afterwards, I got to chat with Aimee a little, and several people shook my hand and told me that they enjoyed my reading. A few even asked where they could find my work or buy a book (and I got to direct them to this shiny new website—hello, festival friends!). A man named Jim made my night by telling me that I have a wonderful sense of humor and that it was so easy to listen to me read my work. I stuck around and chatted for quite a while with a couple of guys named Sharif and Tyson, and we covered everything from prose poetry vs. flash fiction to sustainability to zombies. All in all, it was a wonderful reading experience.

My other festival highlights include:
– hearing Aimee Bender read an incredible short story and then having her be super classy and stay for my reading. (Seriously, if you haven’t read her novels or short stories, you need to do so immediately. It doesn’t matter who you are or what books you usually like. I promise that you will love her work.)
– hearing my colleague Ralph Carlson read from his book Waiting to Say Amen. I already enjoyed his poems, but they came alive wonderfully when he read them. I’m so excited that he’ll be visiting my poetry class in a couple of weeks to talk with my students about this book.
– talking with some people in the Zzyzyx WriterZ group, hearing some of these writers read from their new anthology, and learning about Poetrypalooza.
– trying to see my colleague Tom Allbaugh read with some students on Friday afternoon, only to have my 16-month-old son shout “Outside!” and “Bye-bye!” repeatedly whenever we entered the room. We ran around and enjoyed the sunny day instead, and my husband got to enjoy this reading for all of us.
– visiting the craft tables and buying a birthday gift for my dear friend Emily Capettini.

Thanks to John Brantingham and company for putting together The San Gabriel Valley Literary Festival. I’m so glad I got to be part of this first festival, and I look forward to many more.