Poetry on Display at Roost

As I flip through the awesome schedule of poetic events during this weekend's Massachusetts Poetry Festival, the only exhibit featured in the book is the Poetry Dress, which is on display in the window at Roost on Front Street.

They have created a wonderful Poetry window, so stop by and check it out - and then check out the festival at Old Town Hall and beyond! 

A Poetic Walking Tour with Salem Historian Jim McAllister

To celebrate the Massachusetts Poetry Festival and Salem’s poetic heritage, Salem historian, author and history columnist Jim McAllister, will offer a lively and entertaining walking tour called Poets, Poetry and Poetic Places in Salem.

The tour will meet on Friday, May 13^th at the main entrance to the Salem Visitor Center on New Liberty Street across from the Peabody Essex Museum at 2:30 p.m.

Come and take a 1 hour and 15 minute grand promenade and hear about important 19^th century poets and their real life or literary connections to Salem.

Stops will include Salem’s famed Lyceum Hall where Emerson lectured 36 times and where Very Jones witnessed Alexander Graham Bell’s first telephone call. You will pass the Quaker Meeting House, Parker Brothers Game Company, the Charter Street Burial ground, the Salem Witch Trials memorial and other sites with surprising and  colorful poetic lore. The tour will end just before 4 p.m. at The Salem Athenaeum on Essex Street in time for Charlotte Gordon’s talk on the illustrious first published American woman poet, Anne Bradstreet. 

A $10 Button ($5 for seniors and students) will be your ticket of entry for all Massachusetts Poetry Festival events. Buttons can be purchased online at MassPoetry.org or in Salem at the following locations:

• Roost, 40 Front Street
• Salemdipity, 86 Wharf Street on Pickering Wharf
• Salem Witch Museum, 19 ½ Washington Square North
• Signatures Apparel, 181 Essex Street (on the Pedestrian Mall)
• Salem Trolley Depot “191 Essex Street (on the Pedestrian Mall)
• Gulu Gulu Cafe, 247 Essex Street

Buy Poetry Festival Buttons in Salem!

Just 11 days remain until the Massachusetts Poetry Festival throws opens its doors in Salem!  We are so excited to be hosting the festival in Salem this year, and would love to be the festival's permanent home.

Workshops, readings and performances will be held at the Peabody Essex Museum, House of the Seven Gables, Green Land Cafe, Salem Athenaeum, Omen, and Universalist Church.  There will be poetry Trolleys, poetry Trains (via the MBTA Rockport/Newburyport lines, coming up from Boston), a small press fair, bad poetry, GREAT poetry, music, and more.  More than 60 poetic events are scheduled for Saturday, May 14th. If you dig poetry, this is a festival not to be missed. 

You need a button to get in, and once you have a button you have all-access, with exception of some workshops that require registration. Buttons cost $10, $5 for students and seniors, and are available online and in Salem at:

• Roost on Front Street
• Salemdipity on Pickering Wharf
• Salem Witch Museum
• Signatures on the Essex Street Pedestrian Mall 
• The Trolley Depot on the Essex Street Pedestrian Mall 

If you buy your buttons in Salem, it's cash-only.  Visit MassPoetry.org to use your favorite credit or debit card.  Regardless of where or how your buy your button, make sure to register at MassPoetry.org so you don't miss a workshop, class, or session. 

Accommodations and Dining for the Mass Poetry Festival

The Poets are coming!  The Poets are coming!!

We are very excited about the Mass Poetry Festival's move to Salem.  If you are planning to come to Salem for the festival on May 13-14, 2011, you will want to be aware of the promotions being offered by some of Salem's savvy accommodations and restaurants.

Visit the Festival web site at MassPoetry.org for the complete list. If you want more options, visit Salem.org and click on STAY or EAT. 

One more poetry note: April is Poetry Month, and Mass Poetry has organized a program called Common Threads, which strives to have 10,000 people across the Commonwealth reading the following seven poems:

• In the Waiting Room by Elizabeth Bishop
• Samurai Song by Robert Pinsky
• The Lost Pilot by James Tate
• Occupation by Suji Kwock Kim
• Vita Nova by Louise Glück
• Love Song: I and Thou by Alan Dugan
• New England Ode by Kevin Young

For more information, and to download your very own Poetry Month Kit, visit MassPoetry.org.

The Massachusetts Poetry Festival is coming to Salem!

The poets are coming! The poets are coming!

Mark your calendar for the Massachusetts Poetry Festival, which will come to Salem on May 13 - 14, 2011.  There will be more than thirty programs, workshops, readings, concerts, slams, and a small press fair throughout downtown Salem as part of the festival. 

Festival Highlights...

Friday evening will feature a program of music and poetry headlined by soldier poet Brian Turner, acclaimed author of a collection of poems entitled Here, Bullet, written after serving for seven years in the U.S. Army. He was an infantry team leader for a year in Iraq with the 3rd Styker Brigade Combat Team, and Infantry Division. Prior to that, Turner deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovnia with the 10th Mountain Division (1999-2000). Here, Bullet, won the 2005 Beatrice Hawley Award, the New York Times “Editor's Choice” selection, the 2006 Pen Center USA "Best in the West" award, and the 2007 Poets Prize, among others and Turner was selected as one of 50 United States Artists Fellows for 2009. 

Turner will be joined on Friday evening by Aimee Nezhukumatathil, an Asian American poet, best known for her jovial and accessible reading style and lush descriptions of exotic foods and landscapes. Nezhukumatathil draws upon her Filipina and Malayali Indian background to give a unique perspective on love and loss, and the land. She is  the author of At the Drive-In Volcano (Tupelo, 2007), winner of the Balcones Prize, and Miracle Fruit (Tupelo, 2003), winner of the ForeWord Magazine Poetry Book of the Year and the Global Filipino Literary Award.

On Saturday, there will literally dozens of performances by poets and musicians throughout downtown Salem. There will be a Small Press Fair, featuring more than 30 Presses that publish poetry in Old Town Hall. The main performance stage will provide a continuous program of music and poetry, and the Massachusetts finalists for Poetry Out Loud will recite their poetry.  In addition, there will be musical perfromances by singer/songwriter Kim Richey, New England Conservatory students, and others. 

Downtown Salem will be infused with poetry from Haiku to Hip Hop, Shakespearean sonnets and spoken work, Elizabeth Bishop at 100 and an intercollegiate Poetry Slam, and much, much more.

For complete information on the festival, visit MassPoetry.org.

Mass Poetry Announces Salem as 2011 Massachusetts Poetry Festival Destination

MassPoetry has chosen historic Salem as the location for the third Massachusetts Poetry Festival to be held on May 13 and 14, 2011.  A two day festival that features poetry readings, slams, workshops, a day of poetry for high school students, and a small press fair highlighting published poets, the event is coordinated by founder Michael Ansara, and by a variety of poetry partners, including Salem State University, Salem Mayor Kimberley Driscoll, Destination Salem, local businesses and poetry enthusiasts.  The Massachusetts Poetry Outreach Project, also known as MassPoetry, sponsors this flagship event and also coordinates outreach programs to bring poetry into schools and communities across the Commonwealth.

“The Massachusetts Poetry Festival will bring a blizzard of verbal beauty to Salem, a city with a rich literary history and vibrant writing community.  It will connect generations, and it will give the city and university a leadership role in building culture in the Commonwealth,” said J.D. Scrimgeour, poet and Professor of English at Salem State University. ‘The Poetry Festival is evidence of the vitality of the fundamental, central art of poetry,” said Robert Pinsky, the former Poet Laureate of the U.S. and the Honorary Chair of the Poetry Festival.

Mayor Driscoll enthused, "Salem is proud of its own unique literary tradition and offers many exciting venues for such an event.  We look forward, with great enthusiasm, to hosting a successful Festival in May, 2011."  Provost Kristin Esterberg from Salem State University also commented, “Salem State has been engaged with the Massachusetts Poetry Festival since its beginning.  We're delighted to continue the tradition which began in Lowell, and we welcome the festival to Salem, another proud literary city in Massachusetts.”  Friday, the first day of the festival, is devoted to high school students and teachers with workshops at Salem State University. Among the  featured readers will be Salem State Alumni, poet Tom Sexton, who has published more than 10 books of poetry and has won numerous regional and national awards for his writing. He is the former poet laureate of Alaska, where he spent much of his life since his childhood in Massachusetts.  Day two of the festival will be open to the public and will include readings, workshops, performances, poetry and dance, Shakespearean sonnets, and slam poetry.  These events will be held across downtown Salem’s cafes, restaurants, historic buildings, churches, museums, and Old Town Hall.

"Given its long literary traditions, Salem, the home of Hawthorne, is an appropriate site for the 2011 Poetry Festival," Congressman John Tierney said. "Salem State University's involvement and the Festival's educational focus for young students will continue to foster creativity and energy across our community." The festival brought over 1000 poetry lovers to Lowell in 2009, and the May, 2011  festival is expected to be even larger.

Massachusetts Poetry Festival

May 13, 14, 2011

www.masspoetry.org