Poetry at the Point: Andrea Scarpino & Eric Doise
Reading from Chamber after Chamber in a celebration of Saara Myrene Raappana
April 22 @ 7:30 pm
This reading will be held in-person at Focal Point, and also streamed live to this event page and to Saint Louis Poetry Center’s Facebook page.
Saara Myrene Raappana’s poetry is haunting, beautiful, and rich with Lake Superior landscapes. It bears witness to both the beauty and violence of rurality and the United States with linguistic whimsy and structural inventiveness. Her most recent book, Chamber after Chamber, won the 2023 Juniper Prize for Poetry and is a meditation on the word “heart” and its many meanings. Thoughtful and daring poetry, Chamber after Chamber was published just days after Saara’s death at age 48. Tonight, we gather to celebrate her poetry and her writing life in a reading and conversation with Saara’s husband Eric Doise and her friend Andrea Scarpino.
HEALTH REQUIREMENTS
Patrons are encouraged to wear face masks when attending Poetry at the Point in-person at Focal Point. Learn more >>
ABOUT THE POETS
Andrea Scarpino has published the poetry collections Once Upon Wing Lake, What the Willow Said as it Fell, and Once, Then, and the co-edited anthology Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice. She received a PhD in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University, and an MFA from The Ohio State University. She is also co-editor of Nine Mile Magazine and served as Poet Laureate of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula 2015-2017. She teaches at St Louis University High School.
Eric Doise is an associate professor of English at Southwest Minnesota State University. He has published articles and chapters in several academic journals and anthologies, including The Routledge Companion to Literature and Trauma. He earned his PhD from the University of Florida.