Woodstock Poetry Society
Featured Reading and Open Mike
Saturday, August 12th, 2023 at 2pm
Woodstock Library

HYBRID: in-person and virtually via Zoom

David Messineo
Will Nixon

Poets David Messineo and Will Nixon will be the featured readers, along with an open mike when the Woodstock Poetry Society meets in person and via Zoom (and streamed live on Facebook: www.facebook.com/WoodstockPoetry) on Saturday, August 12th, 2023 at 2pm(eastern).

WPS meetings are held the 2nd Saturday (2pm) of every month.

Woodstock Library
5 Library Lane, Woodstock, NY 12498
(845) 679-2213
www.woodstock.org

*** We ask all people who wish to attend in person to self-test for Covid within 24 hours prior to the event. Self-test kits are reasonably priced and available at nearly every pharmacy. ***

The Zoom app can be downloaded here: Zoom Download Center

To attend virtually: contact phillip@woodstockpoetry.com to receive Zoom info
If attending, please indicate if you would like to be on the open mike. Thank you.

The reading will be hosted by poet Phillip X Levine. All meetings are free, open to the public, and include an open mike.

Features:

David Messineo - David Messineo is pleased to bring his Golden Anniversary Tour - celebrating 50 consecutive years of his poetry writing - to our series. In 2023, David is among the 15 longest-serving poetry editors and literary magazine publishers still active in the United States, and hosts one of the 25 longest operating poetry reading series in the U.S., the Sensations Magazine Creative Events Series, founded in 1988. For his work with the publication he founded and runs, Sensations Magazine, he received a 2009 New Jersey State Jefferson Award for Public Service, and was a three-time-winner in the national American Literary Magazine Awards. David is the author of 12 published books, consisting of 11 poetry collections and one novella. Copies of the First Edition of his new 300-page collection Golden, and his earlier book Childhood, may be purchased with cash at today's reading.



The Palace of Nine Perfections

A steep slant of lapis lazuli tile
leads the eye along this roof
of brilliant blue, curving to cornices
of carefully perched dragons.

From the bamboo railing,
I watch as the wind
pulls pine needles from the tree
perched precariously on the cliff.

While I stand in the soft safety of
this massive mountaintop palace,
I readily relate to
the fragility of the tree:

the merciless wind that
picks piece by piece
'til branches are bare,
the solidity of soil
that lets needles renew.

And I revel quietly in
this rice paper moment,
the duality of something
so fragile, yet
so strong.

-David Messineo

*

Will Nixon - Will Nixon is the author of The Pocket Guide to Woodstock and the co-author with Michael Perkins of Walking Woodstock: Journeys into the Wild Heart of America's Most Famous Small Town. His poetry books include My Late Mother as a Ruffed Grouse, Love in the City of Grudges, and Acrostic Woodstock. Now he's writing acrostic poems about Saugerties. And living in Kingston.. His website is willnixon.com.



Shout Out Saugerties
      --For Suzanne Bennett

She's stormed out, the sad-eyed lady of the lowlands.
He's thrown in the keys, the green-eyed monster from the lake.
Our faith in fairy tales has flown out the window
Under skies filled with fortress clouds that threaten rain.
This is no time to put on your riot boots for the clown parade.

Our confidence has gone off to sulk on a church bench.
Understanding Zoom room is a colossal migraine.
This is no time to steal off with the lonely parking meters.

She wants her lowlands back. He can't breathe without his gills.
All the effort public works put into draining the lake
Under the auspices of the dry lands task force
Gives us nowhere to skinny dip under a naked moon & stars.
Everything we expected from a happy ending stands six feet apart.
Reality has got us by the short hairs. This is
The time you can't remember what you're supposed to say.
Is there a moral to this story that began with mismatched lovers
Eating the silence between them with mismatched eyes? Yes,
Someday they'll meet again, if not in heaven, then in Saugerties.

-Will Nixon

*

WPS 2023 Schedule - now in-person at the Woodstock Library and via Zoom (and streamed live on Facebook: www.facebook.com/WoodstockPoetry)
All WPS Events: Events

01/January 14th - Danielle Woerner; Virginia Konchan (via Zoom only)
02/February 11th - Alison Koffler; Dayl Wise
03/March 11th - Allison Argueta; Brianna Heller
04/April 8th - Darcy Smith; Dennis Wayne Bressack
05/May 13th - Jerrice J. Baptiste; Mary K O'Melveny
06/June 10th - Irene Sipos; Perry S. Nicholas
07/July 8th - Kateri Kosek; Raphael Kosek
08/August 12th - David Messineo; Will Nixon
09/September 9th - Barbara Ungar; Lucia Cherciu
10/October 14th - Bracha Nechama Bomze; Reagan Upshaw
11/November 18th - George Quasha; Sam Truitt 3rd Saturday
12/December 9th - Lisa St. John; Lissa Kiernan and Annual Business Meeting

Also, why not become a 2023 Member of the Woodstock Poetry Society?

Membership is $20 a year. (To join, send your check to the Woodstock Poetry Society, P.O. Box 531, Woodstock, NY 12498. Include your email address as well as your mailing address and phone number. Or join online at: www.woodstockpoetry.com/become.html). Your membership helps pay for meeting space rental, post-office-box rental, the WPS website, and costs associated with publicizing the monthly events. One benefit of membership is the opportunity to have a brief biography and several of your poems appear on this website.

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