Our next Board meeting is Thursday, December 7th at 6:30 at Sal Salerno’s home–email info@mostpoetry.org for more information!
Nov 18
10th Annual New Year’s Poetry Challenge
It is time to sign up for the 10th annual NEW YEAR’S POETRY CHALLENGE! The NYPC will start on December 8 and run for 30 days. Each day we’ll send you a prompt and you can write a poem, save the prompt for later, change it to fit what you need, or delete immediately. Poets of all experience levels are welcome. You don’t have to send in your poems and no one will check up on your work. This is just for fun.
So, if you want to jump in on this year’s NYPC, send your name and email to info@mostpoetry.org. You must OPT IN on this even if you’ve participated before. So, come on! Opt in and have some fun with poetry as you bring in 2018!
6th Annual Modesto Poetry Festival
We are thrilled to announce the details of our 6th Annual Modesto Poetry Festival, coming up on February 3rd!
Each year in February we organize and hold an all-day poetry festival featuring workshops, readings, and a featured poet. This year, we are proud to welcome featured poet William O’Daly as our guest poet and workshop leader.
Join us on Saturday, February 4th, 2017 at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Modesto for a day of poetry, learning, and inspiration! Click on the image at right to download the PDF flyer, and you can click here to download the registration form (which also has details about this year’s festival poetry contest).
Themes for this year’s contest are 1. Arrivals and Departures; 2. The Disappearance of Things; 3. Empty Spaces; 4. Inheritances. Submissions to the poetry contest must be postmarked by the CONTEST DEADLINE: JANUARY 11, 2018. Please see the form for more information.
Second Tuesday @ Barkin’ Dog
December’s 2nd Tuesday Reading Series is on December 12 at 6:00 at the Barkin’ Dog! Our featured poets are the Meter Maids. Don’t forget to stay for our open mic after the reading!
Poetry on Sunday @ Carnegie
Our Poetry on Sunday quarterly reading series at Carnegie Arts Center in Turlock continues on December 10th at 2 pm in the Gemperle Gallery–click here or on the image at right to view the PDF flyer.
Featured readers for the December reading:
Angela Morales Salinas was born in Cerritos, San Luis Potosi, Mexico, and emigrated to the United States as a child. She has lived in the San Joaquin Valley for most of her life, and taught Kindergarten for twenty-seven of her forty-year career as an educator. She has been published locally, and was proud to be included in More Than Soil, More Than Sky: The Modesto Poets (Quercus Review Press, 2011). Angela was there when the Licensed Fools came into existence, and is happily continuing her foolish ways.
Born in Los Angeles, Mark Nicoll-Johnson has lived in Modesto since 1980. In 2014, he retired after nearly 40 years of teaching, the last 24 of which as a member of the Department of English at Merced College, where at one time or another he counted among his colleagues Angela Morales and Meg Withers.
Linda Toren is a retired elementary school teacher who lives in the foothills of Calaveras County along with her husband, a horse, chickens, two goats, a box turtle, and cats and dogs. She teaches poetry in two local schools, is an active Friend of the Library and belongs to two writer’s groups—Licensed Fools (Modesto/Turlock) and Pine Grove Writer’s Group (PGWG—“Pig Wigs”.) Her most current poems appear in Out of the Fire by Manzanita Press.
Meg Withers has been writing to save her sanity since she was about 9. She has been published in literary journals and other creative projects. She has been anthologized, and has three published books: Must Be Present to Win (Ghost Road 2005), A Communion of Saints (TinFish 2008). Shadowed: Unheard Voices (Press at Fresno State 2014). The latter was edited with Joell Hallowell. The basis for Meg’s work is concern with the attempt to silence voices.