LitPDX seeks to amplify marginalized voices, and welcomes all, their ideas, their events, and their words.

For details regarding specific events please contact the organizers or venues. If you are an organizer or venue and would like to reach out to us please feel free to contact us or submit an event using our submission form. We’d love to hear from you!

The Verse featuring Jonie Blinman

Devil's Den 1510 NE Alberta St, Portland, OR, United States

The Verse is happening every first Friday of the month at the Devil's Den presented to you by Nova Productions in collaboration with songwriter Jonie Blinman! Join us for a night of music and spoken word where incredibly talented local artists share their amazing works in the intimate environment of our favorite wine shop in town! On June 7th, enjoy the music and poetry from Trent Toney, Kyndel Dollison, Red O’Hare, Rosa Linda & Frank Salcido, Sunny Pache and your guest host Igor Brezhnev. The Den has a huge selection of wines but also beer and cider! This is a 21+ establishment but your puppies are welcome! There is no cover however we have a huge bucket for tips and each dollar made during the…

Free – $5

Fonograf Benefit Fundraiser Party

Outlet 2500 Northeast Sandy Boulevard, Portland, OR, United States

On Saturday, June 8 from 7pm-9pm at Outlet, the non-profit literary record label Fonograf Ed. presents a benefit fundraiser to inaugurate both the summer and the label’s new and forthcoming releases. The event will feature readings/performances from poet Anis Mojgani (http://thepianofarm.com) and musical groups Whip (https://www.timesbold.net/) and Deserve (https://deserve.bandcamp.com/). Sara Brant Guest and Jeff Alessandrelli will host the evening. The zero waste pop-up shop UTILITY will also be on site from 5-7pm; find more info about UTILITY at https://www.utilityzerowaste.com/. Outlet is the studio space of Kate Bingaman-Burt. It also hosts workshops and facilitates pop-up events and projects. About Fonograf Editions: Fonograf Ed. publishes albums influenced by language and literature. Each release is available in both an analog and digital format, with a particular focus on…

Free

Wordlights: Saturday Poetry Evenings

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

Wordlights Saturday poetry evenings presented by NovaPDX, Rocking Frog Cafe and hosted by Igor Brezhnev. On Saturday June 8th, we'll have a feature from Micah Fletcher, two mini features from Red O'Hare & David McIntire, and a short set poetry open mic! OUR FEATURE: Micah Fletcher Micah Fletcher is a nationally recognized poet and spoken word artist who took first place in Portland Oregon’s city wide youth poetry competition called Verselandia in 2013. MINI FEATURES FROM: Red O’Hare Red O'Hare is a Ashkenazi Jewish American poet from Oakland, California where she featured twice with Bay Area Generations. A product of Presbyterian missionaries from the Belgian Congo and Eastern European carny folk, Red has been performing poetry for 20 years with varying rates of success. She…

Free

Spare Room Reading: Alan Bernheimer and Seann McCollum

Passages Bookshop 1801 NW Upshur, Suite 660, Portland, OR, United States

Alan Bernheimer's latest collection is From Nature (Cuneiform Press, 2019). Recent work has appeared at Across the Margin and at SFMOMA's Open Space and in The Equalizer, The Delineator, and Hambone. The Spoonlight Institute was published by Adventures in Poetry in 2009. Born and raised in Manhattan, he has lived in the Bay Area since the 1970s. He produces a portrait gallery of poets reading on flickr. His translation of Philippe Soupault's memoir, Lost Profiles: Memoirs of Cubism, Dada, and Surrealism, was published by City Lights in 2016. More information is at The Electronic Poetry Center. Seann McCollum is an art-school dropout from Philadelphia and the author of twenty-odd self-published books of poetry and prose.  He is currently at work on a book-length apology for helping…

Free – $5

Poetry Slam and Open Mic feat. Avery Gadling

Tiny's Coffee - NE MLK Jr 2031 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR, United States

Join us for another amazing poetry slam and open mic!!! There is a 5 dollar suggested donation for this event but no one is turned away. We will have a feature from Avery Gadling! More about Avery: Avery Gadling is a southern transplant who lost his accent on their journey over the mountains. They love their homemade family, Magic, and their four legged toddler. (Who, in all forms, is way cooler than he is) Avery can often be found writing, drawing, and creating impossible things. You can find Averys work across multiple platforms. Most activly instagram @Gadlingpoetry and Facebook @Gadlingpoetry We will be at our venue, Tiny's Coffee Northeast! This means our show is all-ages! Everyone is welcome. We do not censor our mic except…

Free – $5

An Evening with Mighty Mike McGee, Anis Mojgani, & Brian Ellis

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

NovaPDX presents a Wordlights Special: An evening with Mighty Mike McGee with special guests, Anis Mojgani & Brian Ellis. It is a rare treat to enjoy poetry from all three of these poets. Mighty Mike McGee Mighty Mike McGee is a well-traveled "stand-up poet" and storyteller from San José, California. In the world of poetry slam, he is the first to win both the 2003 National Poetry Slam Individual Grand Championship and the 2006 Individual World Poetry Slam Grand Championship. He has toured very extensively throughout United States, Canada and Europe. Since 2002, he's covered several hundred thousand miles performing his brand of poetry and humor. McGee has been featured on HBO's Def Poetry Jam, CBC Radio and Television, and NPR's Snap Judgment. He was…

$5 – $15

Ariana Reines

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

Ariana Reines’s A Sand Book (Tin House) is a poetry collection in nine parts, a travel guide that migrates from wildfires to hurricanes, Tweety Bird to the president, lust to aridity, desertification to prophecy, and mother to daughter. It explores the negative space of what is happening to language and to consciousness in our strange and desperate times. From Hurricane Sandy to the murder of Sandra Bland to the massacre at Sandy Hook, from the sand in the gizzards of birds to the desertified mountains of Haiti, from Attar's Conference of the Birds to Chaucer's Parliament of Fowls to Twitter, A Sand Book is about change and quantification, the relationship between catastrophe and cultural transmission. In her long-awaited follow-up to Mercury, Reines has written her…

Free

The Turnout presents Girls With Heads at The Secret Society

The Secret Society 116 NE Russell St, Portland, OR, United States

The Turnout presents Girls With Heads at The Secret Society Girls With Heads is a theater showcase made up of female-identified performers. At Girls With Heads, the stage holds space for a rotating cast of women/ladies/femmes to present live music, performance art, poetry and storytelling — all interspersed with a fresh palate cleanser of improvisational comedy. Girls With Heads is about being empowered and unapologetic and welcome on stage. It’s about finding strength and confidence — not only within us, but also within our community. It’s about shining the bright beam of comedy straight at the darkest of our hours. And the result? Well, it’s nothing short of magic. This months theme is SWEET HEAT

$10

Judith Montgomery and E. Ivy Ross Ricci

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

We are thrilled to welcome two poets to the store, one debuting her first collection and one returning with her fourth: E. Ivy Ross Ricci and Judith H. Montgomery. Ivy Ross Ricci is a musician, writer, educator, and activist based in Port Angeles, Washington, who lived for many years in Portland. Her debut collection of poetry, The Force of Gravity, is playful and profound, an honest portrait of a growing writer surrounded by the intoxicating buzz of 24-hour poetry. Since 1996, Ricci has been recognized for her contributions and leadership in the fields of girls’ empowerment, literacy, public art, women’s health, juvenile justice & youth advocacy, music education, teen peer leadership training, implementation of anti-bias curricula, and creative after-school programming. Her original songs exude gumption,…

Free

Slamlandia June Literary Arts Show ft. Nastashia Minto

Literary Arts 925 SW Washington Street, Portland, OR, United States

Join us on JUNE 13TH for our second Thursday Poetry Open Mic and Slam! Doors and sign-ups are at 6:30 PM Get there on time to get a spot in the open mic or slam! Show begins at 7:00 PM Literary Arts 925 SW Washington Street Portland, OR 97205 This show is all ages. Please see our Accessibility and Safer Space info below. No door admission. We will have a spotlight performance from the one and only Nastashia Minto! Nastashia Minto is a Black woman who has an associate’s degree in occupational therapy and a bachelor’s degree in psychology. She has been writing since she was nine years old and has found that her writing offers her another way to help people. Currently residing in…

Free