Schedule of Poets and Writers Reading Todayfor Born to the Beat,
the National Beat Poetry Festival event for New Orleans

2:00 - 3:00

Dennis Formento , (Louisiana poet, 1954-- ) Slidell, Bayou Bonfouca watershed, husband of artist & yogini Patricia Hart. He was a student of Allen Ginsberg, Robert Creeley, Amiri Baraka and Diane di Prima at Naropa Institute (now Naropa University) in Boulder, CO.

Formento's new book is Cineplex (Paper Press.) He is New Orleans co-ordinator of 100,000 Poets for Change and attended the movement's first global conference in Salerno, Italy, June 2015. Published recently in Lummox Anthology, Maple Leaf Rag, and the website, Water Water Everywhere. Several of his poems have been featured in "poetry boxes" on the North Shore, curated by St. Tammany Poetry on the Street and in Slidell by Juneau Gallery.

His poem, "If You're Waiting for the Future," will appear in St. Tammany Parish Habitat for Humanity's commemorative volume,

Kelly Harris is a poet and the founder of BrassyBrown.com . She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Lesley University. She is a Cave Canem fellow. Her poems have appeared in Say It Loud: Poems for James Brown, Yale University's Caduceus, PMS, The Southern Women's Review, PLUCK Magazine, DrumVoices Revue and other publications. She is the co-editor of The Crooked Room: Stories from New Orleans .


Carolyn Hembree 's debut poetry collection, Skinny, was published by Kore Press in 2012. Her forthcoming collection, Rigging a Chevy into a Time Machine and Other Ways to Escape a Plague , is the winner of the 2015 Trio Award and 2015 Rochelle Ratner Memorial Award. Her work has appeared in Colorado Review, The Journal, Poetry Daily, The Southern Poetry Anthology, Verse Daily , and other publications. Carolyn comes from Tennessee. She is an assistant professor at the University of New Orleans and serves as poetry editor of Bayou .


Poet Julie Kane is a scholar, editor, and a Professor of English at Nortwestern State University. She has won multiple awards for her poems and her poetry collections. Her books include Rhythum & Booze, Jazz Funeral, and Paper Bulllets , a collection of light verse. From 2011-2013, she was the Louisiana Poet Laureate. She is also the great-grandchild of eight Irish immigrants and was born in Boston, Massachusetts. She grew up in Massachusetts, upstate New York, and New Jersey, and graduated from Cornell University with a B.A. in English. One of Anne Sexton's graduate poetry students at Boston University at the time of Sexton's suicide, Kane moved to Louisiana after marrying a native, then stayed after the marriage ended. Read more about Kane at her website, JulieKanePoet.com .

3:00 - 4:00

Mona Lisa Saloy , Author & Folklorist, Educator, and Scholar. An award-winning author of contemporary Creole culture in poems about Black New Orleans before and after Katrina, as a Folklorist, Saloy documents sidewalk songs, jump-rope rhymes, and clap- hand games to discuss the importance of play. As a poet, her first book, Red Beans & Ricely Yours, won the T.S. Eliot Prize and the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award and tied for a third. She's written on the significance of the Black Beat poets, on the African American Toasting Tradition, on Black & Creole talk, on conditions and keeping Creole after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, and her new book, Second Line Home, is a refreshing collection of poems that captures the day-to-day New Orleans speech, contemplates family dynamics, celebrates New Orleans, and all in a way everyday people can enjoy.


MC: Megan Burns is the publisher at Trembling Pillow Press (tremblingpillowpress.com) and edits the poetry magazine, Solid Quarter (solidquarter.blogspot.com). She also hosts the Blood Jet Poetry Reading Series in New Orleans. She has been most recently published in Jacket Magazine, Callaloo, New Laurel Review, Trickhouse, and the Big Bridge New Orleans Anthology. Her poetry and prose reviews have been published in Tarpaulin Sky, Gently Read Lit, Big Bridge, and Rain Taxi. She has two books Memorial + Sight Lines (2008) and Sound and Basin (2013) published by Lavender Ink. She has two recent chapbook: a city/ bottle boned (Dancing Girl Press, 2012) and Dollbaby (Horseless Press, 2013). Her latest chapbook i always wanted to start over was released from Nous-Zot Press in 2014. Her third book, Commitment, was published in 2015.


Alex Jennings considers himself first and foremost an Afropunk fantasist. Born in Wiesbaden, Germany, Alex was raised in Gaborone, Botswana, Paramaribo, Surinam, Tunis, Tunisia, and the United States. He is an author, standup comic and actor and working in New Orleans. His stories have appeared in Spicy Slipstream Stories, Electric Velocipede, Stories for Chip, and the local half-sketch-half improve showcase, You Don't Know The Half of It. He is also a writer for the upcoming Goodnight NOLA show with John Calhoun, and he MCs the monthly Dogfish Reading Series and open mic. He is currently completing his novel, PEACHES! A Jazz Fantasy while performing regularly in New Orleans and Lafayette.


Gina Ferrara has several collections of poems that include: The Size of Sparrows (Finishing Line Press 2006) Ethereal Avalanche (Trembling Pillow Press 2009) Amber Porch Light (CW Books 2013) and Carville: Amid Moss and Resurrection Fern (FLP 2014). She is a guest artist at the Low Residency MFA Program at the University of New Orleans. Her poetry has appeared in Callaloo, anderbo, Valley Voices and others. She has received grants from the Louisiana Division of the Arts and The Elizabeth George Foundation. Since 2007 she has been curating The Poetry Buffet, a monthly reading series presented by the New Orleans Public Library. Her work is forthcoming in Louisiana Literature and the Lowestoft Chronicle.




(emcee)

William F. DeVault American born poet and author referred to as "The Romantic Poet of the Internet." Editor and publisher of "amomancies" a literary/photography fusion mag sometimes called "the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition of literary magazines."  Sixteen book, five CDs, collaborations with other poets and Dutch hardcore techno recording artist Ophidian, podcaster, his catalog of poetic works is estimated at over 24,000 poems, most of which are not slated for publication until after he dies.




Gina Ferrara

John Gery

Tyler Gillespie

Kia Groom

Kelly Harris-DeBerry

Carolyn Hembree

Alex Jennings (emcee)

Julie Kane

Biljana Obradovic

Valentine Pierce

A Scribe Called Quess?

M.E. Riley

Kristina Robinson

Mona Lisa Saloy

Clare Welsh

Music by The Shiz


Nordette N. Adams (Coordinator)

National Beat Poetry Festival NOLA
Saturday, September 12, 2015, 2:00-6:00 p.m.
Morning Call Coffee Stand City Park, New Orleans, Louisiana

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