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Paulann Petersen

Broadway Books 1714 NE Broadway, Portland, OR, United States

We welcome Oregon Poet Laureate Emerita Paulann Petersen to read from her new collection of poetry, One Small Sun, published by Salmon Poetry. The poems take readers from a fur shop in Oregon to a Hyderabadi shrine in India's subcontinent. Tapping deeply into memory, relying on poetry's ability to bring alive again what is coded into the blood, these poems ultimately form an arc of an aging woman's life. This collection tells the tales of what she has always realized, is ever learning, but -- only through poetry's vehicle -- can truly know. Petersen was born in Portland and graduated from Franklin High School. She attended college at Pomona College in California and Southern Oregon State College in Ashland, earning a master's degree in Humanities, Fine…

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Free

Verselandia! East Side Slam

Mt. Hood Community College Theatre 26000 SE Stark Street, Gresham, OR, United States

Literary Arts’ Youth Programs presents the first annual Verselandia! East Side Slam. Cheer on high school students in your community as they perform original poetry in front of a panel of judges. Students from participating East Multnomah County high schools will be competing at this event. Following the same rules as national poetry slams, students must perform original work without props, costumes, or music in front of a panel of judges and a live audience. Using a scale of one to ten, the judges will rate both the performance and the writing of each student. Please note that high school students may use adult language and explore adult themes. This event is free and open to the public. Please share with your community and join…

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Free

QUEER PDXpression

Local Lounge 3536 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR, United States

Please join us Thursday May 16th at the Local lounge. Sign ups will start at 6:30pm and show is at 7:00 pm. We will have the lovely Andy Lee Anderson as our feature. With a mix authentic vulnerability, relevant truth, and humor, Andy Anderson writes poems that make you want to be their friend. They are author of Hello, My Name is Andy, and their work appears in Deep Overstock Journal. Buy their book at this link: https://www.blurb.com/b/9405616-hello-my-name-is-andy Books will also be available at event.

Free

Slamlandia May Picnic PDX Poetry Open Mic

Picnic PDX 1305 NW 23rd Ave, Portland, OR, United States

Join us on MAY 16TH for our third Thursday Poetry Open Mic! Doors and sign-ups are at 6:30 PM Get there on time to get a spot in the open mic! Show begins at 7:00 PM Picnic PDX 1305 NW 23rd Avenue Portland, OR 97210 This show is all ages. Please see our Accessibility and Safer Space info below. $5 suggested donation at door. This show will not have a poetry slam or a featured poet. We ask for just poetry on this mic, no music or stand up comedy. ★ •*´¨`*• O P E N • M I C •*´¨`*• ★ The open mic will start the show out. The open mic is a great way to share your wonderful poetry! You can share…

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Free – $5

Poets Rob Schlegel & Jessica Laser

Powell's Books on Hawthorne 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland, OR, United States

Rob Schlegel stands among the genderless trees to shake notions of masculinity and fatherhood. Schlegel’s In the Tree Where the Double Sex Sleeps (University of Iowa) is a tender search for the mother in the father, the poet in the parent, the forest in the human. Sergei Kuzmich From All Sides (Letter Machine) is the debut collection from Jessica Laser, of which poet Margaret Ross says, "The visceral pleasure one experiences reading these poems corresponds to the depth of their ambition: to fathom human feeling – its contradictions, its infinite shifts – and 'see how full of changes change is.'"

Free

Comedy vs. Tragedy #15

Cider Riot 807 NE Couch St, Portland, OR, United States

Three musicians vs. three poets vs. three comedians! - the audience picks the winners! Plus a featured performance and a raffle! ************************************************** PRICE OF TICKETS $10 online with an advanced purchase or $15 at the door. Get yours now at WWW.NOVAPDX.ORG ************************************************** ROUND ONE – NINE PERFORMERS Three poets will perform one piece in their round. Then the audience will select their favorite performance by applause and that poet will advance to the final round. Then three comedians will perform and the audience will select one to advance. Then three musicians will perform and the audience will select one of them to join the poet and the comedian in the final round. FEATURE PERFORMANCE - Trill LeBeau of Cosmic Serenity SPECIAL GUEST: A Strange Bird…

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$10 – $15

STRAY Record Release Party

Nationale 3360 SE Division, Portland, OR, United States

Saturday, May 18, 3pm at NATIONALE, Fonograf Editions presents a record release celebration for Shannon Ebner’s STRAY: A Graphic Tone. Ebner’s project collates poems by Susan Howe and Nathaniel Mackey, exploring the experiments and politics of poetic form. Portland poets John Beer and Endi Bogue Hartigan will each read from Howe’s and/or Mackey’s works as well as from their own. Additional reader(s) TBA. Nationale (est. 2008) is an art space dedicated to the promotion of culture through exhibitions, performances, and a small selection of various publications. Located at 3360 SE Division, Portland, OR. John Beer is the author of Lucinda & The Waste Land and Other Poems, and the editor of Poems (1962-1997) by Robert Lax. He teaches at Portland State University. Endi Bogue Hartigan…

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Free

Wordlights: Saturday Poetry Evenings

Rocking Frog Cafe 2511 SE Belmont St, Portland, OR, United States

Wordlights Saturday poetry evenings presented by Nova PDX, Rocking Frog Cafe and hosted by Igor Brezhnev. On Saturday May 18th, we'll have a feature from Julia Gaskill and a long set poetry open mic! OUR FEATURE: Julia Gaskill is a professional daydreamer hailing from Portland, Oregon. When she’s not hosting Slamlandia, she can be found performing on the Portland Poetry Slam stage, exploring the Pacific Northwest, or walking your dog. Julia has competed in IWPS, WOWPS, and NPS throughout 2016 - 2018, and she was the Portland Poetry Slam rep at WOWPS 2018 in Dallas, TX. Her work has been featured on FreezeRay Poetry, Ink&Nebula, Slam Find, Write About Now, Rising Phoenix Review, and Voicemail Poems. It goes without saying that she loves Muppets more…

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Free

Tess Gallagher in Conversation With Greg Simon & Danielle Vermette

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Tess Gallagher’s new poems are suspended between contradiction and beauty. Is, Is Not (Graywolf) upends our notions of linear time, evokes the spirit and sanctity of place, and hovers daringly at the threshold of what language can nearly deliver while offering alternative corollaries as gifts of its failures. Gallagher will be joined in conversation by poet Greg Simon and writer Danielle Vermette.

Free

Reading with Jason Christie and jayy dodd

The Stacks Coffeehouse 1831 N. Killingsworth St, Portland, OR, United States

Join us for an evening of poetry with Jason Christie and jayy dodd. What happens to identity when we're obsessed with self-surveillance and devalued words? Now that we've sold ourselves to ourselves, shuffling letters and sounds around to hide the pain, how do we represent the uncanny valley in which we've set up shop? In lèse-majesté, Jason Christie recoils in horror at the thoroughness of his self, then begins to write toward a new understanding brokered between all the things that define him and who he thinks he should be and interrogates how we reduce people to words, especially online, turning them into objects. Jason Christie is the author of Canada Post, i-ROBOT, Unknown Actor, and a coeditor of Shift & Switch: New Canadian Poetry.…

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Free
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