3/21/10

April 26: Brian S. Ellis Features



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On April 26th, we finish National Poetry Month with performance poet Brian S. Ellis, who will be returning to Boston after an extended tour across the nation.

Brian S. Ellis is a writer and performer based out of Jamaica Plain. He’s represented the Boston Poetry Slam at the National Poetry Slam and the Individual World Poetry Slam; co-founded the Whitehaus Family Record, a venue and arts collective in Jamaica Plain; and published Uncontrolled Experiments in Freedom, a collection of his poems with Write Bloody Books, in 2008. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize twice.

Purchase Brian S. Ellis' book from Write Bloody Press.





April 19th: Lee Litif and Chris Robbins Return

Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On April 19th, Stone Soup will feature the return of Lee Litif and Chris Robbins, the Fifth and Sixth Horsemen of The Apocalypse. Due to the extreme subject matter of both poets, this show will not be aired on Cambridge or Lowell public access, and large portions of the show will not be able to be uploaded on YouTube. Therefore, the show is best viewed live.



Photo by Bill Perrault

The most infamous open miker at the venue. Lee Litif has been a regular contribution to the Stone Soup open mike since 1991. He's the author of several chapbooks, including Unpatriotic Flags and Abominating White Houses, Reckless Paella and Defecating Republicans, and Ultrasonic Amplifiers and Marshall Amps/Genital Wart Puking Rednecks. He's been described as "The love child of Gallagher and Larry Fischer with G.G. Allin as midwife" by Chad Parenteau and "the orgasm that never quite made it," by Walter Howard.


Photo by Bill Perrault

If you can imagine Alice Walker dating Jim Morrison and their kid having George Carlin and John Valby for teachers, you’d have a fair picture of Chris Robbins. His darker side is a cross between “Animal Farm” and “Animal House”. Ever since he discovered that he has Asperger’s Syndrome, he quit writing feminist poems in favor of writing autistic ones because he believes that he’ll become more relevant that way. In other words, just like former Boston Red Sox player Manny Ramirez joining the Los Angeles Dodgers, Chris is playing on a different team now, but he’s still playing the same game.


April 12: April Ranger Features



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On April 12, we welcome longtime local performer April Ranger for her first Stone Soup feature.

April Ranger is a Boston-based poet and playwright. She represented the Cantab Lounge at the 2009 Individual World Poetry Slam in Berkeley, California. As part of the Cantab's 2008 Team she performed on Final Stage in Madison, Wisconsin. April has featured her work on stages across New England, and holds a degree in theater from Emerson College. She currently resides in Jamaica Plain.
April 5: Janaka Stucky Features



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. April 5 marks the beginning of Stone Soup's celebration National Poetry Month. We start off by also celebrating Janaka Stucky's long-awaited return to Stone Soup.

Janaka Stucky is practicing the perfection of effort while working on silent relationships with knives, hairpins, & a history of tentacles. Other passions include whiskey and pugilism. He is also the Publisher of Black Ocean and its literary magazine, Handsome. His latest chapbook, Your Name Is The Only Freedom, is now available from Brave Men Press. Some of his other poems have appeared in Cannibal, Denver Quarterly, Fence, Free Verse, No Tell Motel, North American Review, Redivider and VOLT. He will also be teaching a 6-week workshop at Grub Street beginning April 18th.

Visit the Black Ocean web site.

Janaka Stucky as featured in The Boston Phoenix.
March 29: David Leo Sirois Features



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On March 29, poet David Leo Sirois has his farewell feature to Stone Soup and Boston as he returns to his home state of Maine.

David Sirois was born in Edmundston, New Brunswick, and grew up across the border in Madawaska, Maine, the northernmost town on the East Coast. He attended Bennington College in Bennington, Vermont, majoring in Literature and Languages. He has served as a staff writer for The Better Drink: A Sparkling Wine and Living Magazine, contributing poetry, essays, fiction and film reviews. His poems have also appeared in journals including Silo, Poesy, Ibbetson Street, I Left This Here For You To Read, and Echoes, and his work was anthologized in Becoming Fire: Spiritual W riting from Rising Generations. David sees writing as a spiritual practice, and has just finished his first full-length book of poems, Silver Shiver.


3/17/10

March 22: The Return of Dave Brinks to Stone Soup



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On March 22, we welcome back poet, author, editor and publisher Dave Brinks all the back from New Orleans.

Brinks is the editor of YAWP: A Journal of Poetry & Art, publisher of Trembling Pillow Press, director of the 17 Poets! Series and founder of The New Orleans School for the Imagination. His poems have been published in Exquisite Corpse, Fell Swoop, La Reata, Meena, New Laurel Review, Slavery and Xavier Review. His collections of poems include The Caveat Onus, The Light on Earth Street, The Secret Brain, How Birds Fly, The Snow Poems, Trail and Eros and A Pot of Lips.


3/10/10

March 15: Gale Batchelder Features at Stone Soup



Stone Soup Poetry meets from 8-10 p.m. every Monday at the Out of The Blue Art Gallery at 106 Prospect Street with an open mike sign-up at 7:30 p.m. On March 15th, we continue our reputation of presenting new voices by featuring past Goba Salon feature, Gale Batchelder.

Gale Batchelder lives in Cambridge. She recently resumed writing poetry after a hiatus of many years. She has studied poetry in Provincetown, New York, and Cambridge, with Elizabeth Alexander, Gail Mazur, John Yau, and Tom Daley. Gale has read her poetry at a number of venues in and around Cambridge and is a member of the Concord Poetry Center and Grub Street Writers. Gale is a co-founder of the cooperative poetry press “Off the Park Press” (New York City). Her poems are included in the anthology New Smoke, a collection inspired by the paintings of Neo Rauch, a contemporary neo-realist German artist. Gale received her BA in philosophy from Beloit College, holds Master's degrees from Boston University and Harvard, and is the founder of New Leadership Group, a consulting firm serving non-profit organizations internationally.