September 15: Mascha Kaleko Presented by David H. Agee and Lee Varon

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 Monday, September 15, Lee Varon and David Agee will introduce the German poet, Mascha Kaleko using her own poems in English translation to illustrate and illuminate the events of her turbulent life.

Mascha Kaleko is counted in Germany as their most famous female poet of the twentieth century. She is virtually unknown here as her work is totally in German language.This presentation will introduce her to an English speaking audience.

Coming from obscurity she started writing in the Berlin literary scene in 1928. Within a brief space her poetry was appearing as a weekly feature on the front pages of Berlin daily newspapers. Wildly successful, in two years her two first books sold some 10,000 copies. When the Nazis discovered she was Jewish her writing was forbidden and her books confiscated and burned. Her personal life was marred by an unpleasant divorce, and although she and her husband managed to flee into exile in America, even after the war the Nazi presence continued to damaged her career.

Throughout, her poems illuminate this life in emotional language understood by all. They speak meaningfully to experiences her listeners everywhere easily relate to, and she never pulls her punches. They range in emotion from meltingly beautiful to to pointedly revealing to wildly amusing and beyond. They are also marvelous works of art, wonderful to hear.

It's time American audiences become aware of her.

David H. Agee is a professional anthropologist who has created video investigations in prose and poetry of the varieties of human experience in strained, tragic, even life-threatening situations.  Some come from his own life, others build on the experiences of others.  Some vignettes introduced at Stone Soup or The Explorers Club include the following:

The Monkey; Minor murder in the Borneo jungle;
Birdsongs; The brief lives and poetry of children murdered in Auschwitz.
The Bone Picker; From the Choctaw Trail of Tears.   
Ronnie Briscoe;  A tale of true bravery in 1943.
The Memory of her Face;  A vehicular, Midsummer’s Night --- mare.
Who's the Terrorist now? A political satire of the 21st century.

Lee Varon lives in Cambridge and writes poetry and fiction. Recently her work has been published in Prick of the Spindle, Willow Review, Sliver of Stone and Spare Change News. She reads he work on Mondays at Stone Soup.

September 8: Ron Goba 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 September 8, we have the return of poet Ron Goba, who will be reading from a selection of poems specifically written for the night.

Ron Goba is the author of such collections as The Music Box, The Custom of Quoting Someone, and Collage As Silkscreen. For several years, he was known as the doorman for the weekly Boston Poetry Slam at the Cantab. In 2011, he released Swan Song, a small collection of poems, to coincide with his reading at the Cantab on the eve of his birthday.  In 2012, his work was included in Songs of Innocence and Sam Adams, a collection of poems co-authored by Prabakar T. Rajan.

September 1: Tom Daley 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 September 1,we welcome Tom Daley back for another Labor Day performance. 

Tom Daley was a machinist for many years and now leads workshops for writers at the Online School of Poetry, the Boston Center for Adult Education, and Lexington Community Education. His poetry has appeared in Fence, Crazyhorse, Denver Quarterly, Witness, Massachusetts Review, 32 Poems, Harvard Review and elsewhere. He is a recipient of the Dana Award in Poetry and was the winner of the Wag’s Revue Winter Writers Contest. He is the author of two plays, Every Broom and Bridget—Emily Dickinson and Her Irish Servants and In His Ecstasy: The Passion of Gerard Manley Hopkins, which he performs as one-man shows. His book of poems, House You Cannot Reach, is forthcoming from FutureCycle Press.

Bonus Performance by JP Lime at Stone Soup Poetry on August 25

In addition to the awesome poetry of Flatline's Kaleigh O'Keefe, we also have a special micro feature with the help of Ivan De Jesus and JP Lime Productions. This Monday is not to be missed.

August 25: Flatline Poetry's Kaleigh O’Keefe 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 August 25, Stone Soup continues it's featuring of the group Flatline Poetry (one member per month) with Kaleigh O’Keefe.

Kaleigh O’Keefe is a performance poet and fine artist working and studying in Boston, Massachusetts, who has shown her work and performed in many venues across New England. Kaleigh is a member of Flatline Poetry, a group of four poets who perform, lead workshops, and organize events.  She currently works to uphold the legacy Lewis Morris started as the president of The OFFICIAL Massart Poetry Alliance, where she organizes and hosts open mics, poetry slams, and special events. In her fine art practice, Kaleigh works mainly with ceramics, but has also worked with iron, bronze, aluminum, steel, rubber, plastic, wood carving and joinery, mixed media, site specific installations, and is a skilled and passionate mold-maker for life and object casting. Kaleigh is also passionate about education, sparked by working with the Gallery Education Team at the Bakalar and Paine Galleries in Boston for the past two years, and is currently working towards a BFA in Sculpture and History of Art of at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design.

August 18: Martin Willitts Jr and Linda Griggs Feature

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 August 18, we welcome the return of Martin Willitts, Jr. and Linda Griggs to Stone Soup.

Martin Willitts Jr. is a retired Librarian living in Syracuse, New York. He was nominated for 8 Pushcart and 7 Best of the Net awards. He provided his hands-on workshfop “How to Make Origami Haiku Jumping Frogs” at the 2012 Massachusetts Poetry Festival. He is the winner of the 2012 Big River Poetry Review’s William K. Hathaway Award ; co-winner of the 2013 Bill Holm Witness Poetry Contest; winner of the 2013 “Trees” Poetry Contest; winner of the 2014 Broadsided award; and winner of the 2014 Dylan Thomas International Poetry Contest.

He has 6 full length books and over 28 chapbooks. His most recent were national chapbook contest winning William Blake, Not Blessed Angel But Restless Man (Red Ochre Press, 2014), national ecological full length contest winner Searching for What You Cannot See (Hiraeth Press, 2013), Before Anything, There Was Mystery (Flutter Press, 2014), and new release Swimming in the Ladle of Stars (Kattywompus Press, 2014). He has more books forthcoming.

Linda Griggs is a Quaker poet who has worked as an elementary school art teacher, a teacher of the mentally challenged, and a mental health counselor.  She worked with at-risk youth In Syracuse, encouraging creativity and how to get along with each other. She currently works as a college professor in the community and human service area at SUNY Empire State College and holds a MPS in the Applied Work of the Humanistic Psychologists.

Linda is the founder and host of The Palace Poetry Group, meeting in Dewitt, NY.  She finds much inspiration for her poetry from nature. Her published work includes The Balance of Love (Willett Press, 2012), The Night of the Starfish People (Willet Press, 2011), and Love Poems of the Universe (Self-published, 2003).

August 11: Jean Dany Joachim 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 August 11, we have a night of poetry populism, as Toni Bee (former Cambridge Poet Populist 2011-2013) welcomes Jean Dany Joachim for his first Stone Soup feature.

Jean Dany Joachim served as Poet Populist of Cambridge, 2009-2011. An author of short stories and poetry, Joachim is also a playwright. He will be reading from his new published collection of poetry, Crossroads / Chimenkwaze (2013) and Avec des Mots (2014). He is the director of City Night Readings, a series featuring diverse poetic talents, writers and artists. His work has been published in numerous international and national anthologies and magazines.

August 4: Diane Sahms Guarnieri and g emil reutter Feature 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 August 4, we welcome the return of Fox Chase poets Diane Sahms Guarnieriand  g emil reutter to the venue.

Diane SahmsGuarnieri is a Philadelphia Poet and Poetry Editor of The Fox Chase Review and co-curates The Fox Chase Reading Series. Her first collection Images of Being was released in October of 2011. She was awarded a grant in poetry from the AEV Foundation in May of 2013 and currently serves as Poet in Residence at Ryerss Museum and Library in Philadelphia. . Diane’s poetry has been published widely in the small and electronic press. You can also visit her on Youtube. 

g emil reutter lives and writes in the Fox Chase neighborhood of Philadelphia where he founded The Fox Chase Review and The Fox Chase Reading Series.  Eight collections of his poetry and prose have been published by Stonegarden.net, Blazevox Books and Persistenica Press. Most recently Carvings in November 2010. You can visit him at  You can also visit him on YouTube. 

 

July 28: Flatline Poetry's Guillermo Caballero 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 July 28, Stone Soup continues it's featuring of the group Flatline Poetry (one member per month) with Guillermo Caballero.

Guillermo is a Boston based artist. Before the formation of Flatline, he worked with fellow teammate Lissa Piercy and co-founded FLOW (the Fundamental Lyricists of Wheelock), whose monthly open mics focus on “performance with a purpose” and have grown to audiences of over one hundred. Guillermo has performed and featured at various venues in and around Boston, including the “if you can Feel it, you can Speak it” open mic and the “Lost Voices of Boston” open mic. In addition to performing poetry, Guillermo has presented on topics of masculinity and leadership. In May of 2014, Guillermo received a Bachelor’s Degree in American Studies, with a double minor in Political Science and Education.

July 21: K. ROADPOET Readers Peddlar Bridges and Lisa Golda-Shields

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 July 21, biker poetry is once again added to our summer schedule with the return of motorcycle poets K. Peddlar Bridges and the debut of Lisa Golda-Shields as part of the Roadpoet Fortnight event this July. 



K. Peddlar Bridges is a prolific and persistent talent, one of the founders of the Biker Poetry movement. Peddlar is a well recognized, unique voice currently living on the North Shore of Boston. The Roadpoet Fortnight is his brain child, and debuted in July, 2013. In addition to being a regular at many poetry venues, he also hosts RoadPoet Café, on ICAM, (the Ipswich Cable access station) and is working on a new collection of works about the poetic heritage of Gloucester.

Lisa Golda-Shields is a poet, editor, and advocate for special needs children, now living in Ipswich. Her first collection of poetry and prose The Infinite Charm of Firefly Glow is currently housed in the Library of Congress. She works with kids and their families, in between various collective and individual literary projects. She is also working on her first novel.

July 14th: Deta Galloway 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 July 14,  regular open micer Deta Galloway has her turn at the feature spot.

Deta Galloway is a poet and artist who has returned to Boston in recent years. She can be seen at open mics around the Boston area, her poems often changing each time she reads them. She wowed the audience at the recent Cambridge River festival, and now she is here for your listening pleasure tonight! Co-hosted by Toni Bee.

Flatline Poetry's Lewis Morris 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 June 30, Stone Soup begins the first of a exciting series of features at the end of each month starting members of the Flatline Poetry group, beginning with Lewis M. Morris.

Lewis M. is a multi-talented poet, writer, beatmaker, MC, and three time Uno Champion of the world. He started writing at the age of eleven, and discovered poetry slam at age fourteen. Since then, he has performed at The Apollo Theater, The Smithsonian, The Bowery Poetry Club, and The Nuyorican, among many others. For his work as a teaching artist, he has received the Newman Civic Fellow Award. He has also won a Mass Poetry Award for Most Versatile Poet. Lewis is the founder of The OFFICIAL Massart Poetry Alliance, a student group that hosts open mics, poetry slams, and special events that have grown to audiences of over one hundred. Currently, Lewis teaches poetry at Dorchester Academy in Dorchester, MA as their Poet in Residence, and is working towards his BFA in the Studio for Interrelated Media at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. To find out more about Lewis, visit https://www.facebook.com/LewisMorrisIzThaIllest or lewism.bandcamp.com.

June 23: An Evening with John Voigt

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 June 23, we have an extended open mic where readers will have the opportunity to perform alongside reknowned jazz bassist Jon Voigt who will also play accompanying "word-sound solo pieces" as part of his visit.

John Voigt has had performances with figures such as Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Keith Jarrett, Bill T. Jones, Allen Ginsberg, Captain Kangaroo, Tuli Kupferberg of the Fuggs, Jemeel Moondoc, and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth.  He has also performed in numerous Broadway musicals and taught the Massachusetts College of Art, and Boston Arts Academy. He currently serves as Librarian/Archivist for Berklee College.

Voigt has served on the Board of Overseers for the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. Prose published by American Library Association, Black American Literature Forum, International Society Of Bassists, Macmillan, MIT Press , Oxford University, Scarecrow Press, C. Scribner's Sons. Prose-poetry published by Olympia Press. Currently editor of Qi Encyclopedia. 

June 16: Susanna Kittredge 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 June 16, writer, workshopper, educator and Jamaica Pond poet Susanna Kittredge returns to the podium for her first full-length feature at Stone Soup.

Native New Englander Susanna Kittredge has a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Her poems have appeared in publications such as Sidebrow, Shampoo, 14 Hills, We Still Like, 580 Split and Salamander as well as the anthology Bay Poetics (Faux Press, 2006). She is a proud member of the Jamaica Pond Poets and a regular participant at the Brighton Word Factory (a bi-weekly open writing group). She lives in Jamaica Plain and teaches middle school inclusion special education in Medford.

June 9: Alice Weiss 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 June 9, we welcome poet and activist Alice Weiss to the podium.

Alice Weiss' poems have been appeared in the Alaska Quarterly Review, Oddball Magazine, Ibbetson Street, Radical Teacher, Liberty’s Vigil, The Occupy Anthology, Poetry Super Highway, Wilderness House Literary Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, and Jewish Currents.  She has also published nonfiction at VoxMom and Wilderness House Literary Review. Until 2011 she was the unofficial Poet-in-Residence at Am HaYam, the Cape Cod Chavurah. She has featured most recently at the Boston Poetry Salon and studies with Tom Daley and Joan Houlihan.

Weiss received an MFA in poetry from New England College in 2010. From 1977 to 1998 she was a civil rights attorney and public defender in New Orleans, Louisiana. This included voting rights cases and challenges to prison conditions, throughout the state. "I came to New Orleans as a young lawyer from the Northeast eager to make change and I was seduced by the dank and swampy and irremediable dysfunction of the place and the wit and sadness and the song people conjured up to deal with it. If I write poetry at all it’s because of the way living in Louisiana unlocked my suburban Jewish heart." She now lives and writes in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

June 2: Emily R. Rudofsky 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 June 2, we start June off with a feature by young poet and recent Yes/No Press author Emily Rudofsky.

Emily R. Rudofsky hails from the Boston area by way of the Mid-Atlantic Region. Her first chapbook, RAVENOUS, was published by Yes/No Press in January, 2014. Her poetry and artwork has appeared in Oddball Magazine, The Gabbler, The Fat City Review, and ZigZag Folios Vol.2. Emily spent her school years reading during math class. Now she spends her workdays reading under her desk. She still gets in trouble.

May 26: David P. Miller 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 May 26, we welcome another friend of Stone Soup and the Boston poetry scene, David Miller.

David P. Miller’s poems have appeared in print in Meat for Tea, Stone Soup Presents and Durable Goods, and online in the Muddy River Poetry Review, Wilderness House Literary Review, and the Boston and Beyond Poetry Blog. His chapbook, The Afterimages, is forthcoming from Červená Barva Press.  His has three “micro-chapbooks” available from the Origami Poems Project website. David was a member of the multidisciplinary Mobius Artists Group of Boston for 25 years, and is a librarian at Curry College in Milton, Mass. He has often been seen in the company of one or more of the Bagel Bards.

May 19: MP Carver Features at Stone Soup Poetry

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 May 12, Stone Soup is please to welcome M.P. Carver to the podium.

M.P. Carver lives in Salem, Massachusetts. A member of YesNo Press, M.P. helps host the twice-monthly Zig Zag Poetry Open Mic (Salem, MA). M.P. has featured at Stone Soup previously, at Speak Up! (Lynn, MA), Merrimac Mic (Newburyport, MA). and most recently in the Poets in the Round event at the 2014 Mass Poetry Festival. M.P.’s poetry has appeared at the Massachusetts State Poetry Festival (2012, part of the Poetry Everywhere art installations), in the University of Virginia’s Hospital Drive, and in the inaugural issue of Zig Zag Folios.

May 12: The Wild Women of Lynn Feature 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 May 12,  Stone Soup's 43rd anniversary month continues strong, as we we have the pleasure of featuring every single contributor from the recommended local Wild Women of Lynn anthology.

Ring of Bone Press is a small publishing house founded in 2013, from Ipswich, MA. The mission of the press is to bring "The American Voice" to you, the reader, by publishing the work of local, under discovered poets and writers. The first book from the press is Wild Women of Lynn: Writings from the Walnut Street Coffee Cafe, poems and writings from five incredibly talented women poets from Lynn, each sharing their versions of "The American Voice."

Kerry Zagarella is a performance poet and toured with the first Boston Poetry Slam Team. She has performed at a variety of venues, including First Night Boston, The DeCordova Museum, The Boston Architectural Society, and the Green Mill in Chicago. Her work has appeared in magazines such as The Stone Soup Quarterly, Borderine Magazine, The Tower Journal and Wail Magazine. Her collection of original poems, Cardboard Soul, was published by This Poet's Press, and one of her essays can be found in A Tribute to Brother Blue by Yellow Moon Press.

Jocelyn Almy-Testa is a not quite 40 year old dancer, mother of four, writer, arts advocate, runner, photographer, sculptor, fiber artist, daughter, sister, lover, housewife, feminist coach and friend. Sometimes she likes to have a glass of wine and just stare out her favorite window and not be anything.

Kato Mele is a writer who has abandoned the idea of keeping up with the Joneses and has instead concentrated on keeping her head above water, which she is current accomplishing in her beloved adopted city of Lynn, Massachusetts - that the great and terrible beauty. She is neighborhood renowned for her use of her wit, her wits and even the occasional use of her half-wits whom she keeps in her shed and deploys only when absolutely necessary as she fears an uprising if they were to gain knowledge of the outside world and al the possibilities it holds. Her work has been sparsely published due to her inability to focus and complete the task at hand, but she has been found between the covers of THIS Magazine, Zig Zag Folios, and she can, truth be told, at the moment to be found between the covers and sheets of her reasonable comfortable bed.

Elizabeth Gordon McKim is a poet, spoken word performance artist, editor and teacher of poetry for people of all ages. She is the author of five books of poetry, the latest being The Red Thread, published by Leapfrog Press and Beyond Words, a poetry guide for parents and teachers co-authored by poet and teacher Judith Steinberg. McKim's poems have appeared in magazines, reviews and journals and she is a member of the graduate faculty of Lesley University in the department of Creative Arts in Learning. Her roots are in the oral tradition of song, story and chant. She is Poet Laureate of the European Graduate School in Saas Fee, Switzerland and locally is known as The Jazz Poet of Lynn, MA where she lives in a renovated shoe factory in Central Square and is often found at the Speak Up! open mic magic evenings at the Walnut Street Coffee Cafe.

May 5: Dennis Daly and Dimitris Lyacos at Stone Soup

Dennis Daly’s first full length book of poetry, The Custom House, was published by Ibbetson Street Press in June, 2012. His second book, a verse translation of Sophocles’ Ajax, was published by Wilderness House Press in August, 2012. A third book entitled Nightwalking with Nathaniel was just released by Dos Madres Press in April 2014. Daly writes reviews regularly for the Boston Small Press and Poetry Scene. He is a former factory worker and labor leader. Follow his blog here: dennisfdaly.blogspot.com.

Dimitris Lyacos is the author of the Poena Damni trilogy, an exceptionally popular and influential work of European avant-garde writing. Translations of the original Greek have appeared in English, German, Italian, Spanish, French and Portuguese, and numerous performances have taken place across Europe and the USA. The trilogy has inspired many sister projects in the fields of drama, contemporary dance, video and sculpture installations, opera and contemporary music. Dimitris Lyacos was 2012 Fellow at the International Writing Program, University of Iowa.