2nd Sunday @2 — Poetry + Prose, April 12

A handful of poets gathered once again in the cavernous lobby of the former bank that is home to Collar Works, the Troy arts organization that has given this reading series a home for local writers. The hosts are Nancy Klepsch & I, Dan Wilcox.  

Nancy was first on the signup sheet & began with a seasonal happy poem, “It’s Still OK to Celebrate,” then a tribute to a South Troy matriarch, the mother of local poet Mary Panza, “Permission to Receive Prayers for Mary Panza the First.”

David Gonsalves read a Nature poem composed of 2 Haiku, then a piece titled “S’matters” like a series of bar jokes.

Tim Verhaegen read a long prose piece on family history, a missing cousin & other discoveries found in a genealogy search, pondering what it would be like to have known him.

I read poems from my folder of poems about poets, poetry, etc., for National Poetry Month, an old piece about a call from “Garrison Keilor,” then a poem card about Poem in Your Pocket Day, “April 30.” 

Julie Lomoe read a bouquet of Nature Haiku forthcoming in an anthology from Moonstone Press of Philadelphia, PA, then a piece on aging along with the Rolling Stones & her fantasy of fucking them all.

Jeffrey signed up after listening to other poets reading their work, his piece was titled “Black & Blue.”

Agapi had joined this open mic in the past when it was at Collar City Mushrooms on 2nd Ave., today she read the meditative “As the Body Fades,” & “Rapture” in which she imagines someone back into life, in images of flowers.

This is a relaxed, informal open mic for writers in whatever genre held on the 2nd Sunday of each month at 2PM, at Collar Works, an arts collective, at 50 4th Street, Troy, NY, — Free!