Celebrations, Workshops, Talks, Readings and other Hokus Pocus

Friday April 20th - Saturday April 21st

This year promises to be an amazing poetry festival directed by the super hero poet January O'Neil. I will be doing five different events on Saturday from 11 am straight through the day. What was I thinking?

Here is my schedule for the Mass Poetry Festival including readings, talks, and live action collaboration.

I am honored to be invited back for a second time as Massachusetts is my home turf; the state I lived in until I left  the country for the first time at 19. When I returned to the United States three years later, I finished my degree at the University of Massachusetts -- in Creative Writing. Then after two years in the Peace Corps, I returned to the Cambridge - Somerville area for another seven years.

Massachusetts is where I first started writing poetry and began sending out my work for publication. However, I knew that I needed to leave New England to learn to trust the sound of my own words. I needed to move away from the familiar and the (at the time) claustrophobic poetry scene in Boston. Now it's ironic to see my name on this poster --- squeezed between Martha Collins and Gail Mazur.

I am also giving a reading and a workshop with the fabulous Kelli Russell Agodon on Tuesday night, April 17th in Portland, Oregon. The workshop is from 3:00-6:00 pm at the Other Words Community Center. The reading begins at 7:00 pm.

Finally, on April 28th I will be presenting at the Fields End Conference at Island Wood on Bainbridge Island. It's a busy month.

I promise this is my last blatant self promotion for a long time. And to that end, I thought I would mention that if you are interested in finding out about writing contests, calls for submission, and other poetry related business, I would love to have you "like" my Susan Rich writer page on Face Book. I confess it would be lovely to have more than my cat and houseplant listed as followers.

And if you haven't already left a message and entered the Big Poetry Giveaway -- do it now! I will mail the two winners their books no matter where they live -- international readers feel free to participate!