Poetry at the Point: Jo Schaper, Erin Wiles & Joss Barton

The 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.

CONTENT WARNING

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Some of the poems during the first set of tonight’s reading contain explicit sexual descriptions, as well as anti-LGBTQ+ language. The poet will reiterate this warning at the beginning and close of the set.

HEALTH REQUIREMENTS

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Event attendees are required to wear a mask, and provide proof of full COVID-19 vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test upon entrance to Focal Point. Learn more >>

ABOUT THE POETS

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JO SCHAPER‘s first publications were two chapbooks: one of railroad poetry, and Riding the Twister–what happened to Dorothy when she returned from Oz. After an interval of 40 years, she produced The Paw Paw Almanac and Reader with Steve Nagle, then The Rockhound Rangers Chronicles chapbook. She and Steve are currently working on River Songs and Wayfaring Sagas -a water themed miscellany. She has BA degrees in writing and geology. and has worked in printing and publishing her whole life. She runs Geo Communications Services, and is a partner in Paw Paw Poets Publishing, LP.

ERIN WILES is a St. Louis poet, editor, and bookmaker. Her works include I & APOCALYPSE (JKPublishing 2006), FRACTALS (Saint Louis Projects 2009), & ANGELS DRIVE ALL OF MY UBERS (poor metaphor design 2020). She and Ellen Herget were co-editors of BAD SHOE, a quarterly handmade journal published from 2010-13, featuring almost exclusively female artists & writers, for which they received a KICKASS AWARD from 52nd City magazine. Wiles got her start in indie publishing as an editor and designer for JKPublishing in Athens, Ohio and then offset press Saint Louis Projects. She also worked in academic publishing at the Ohio University Press, her alma mater (2006// BA summa cum laude). Wiles’ current publishing outfit is Poor Metaphor Design. Wishing to integrate physical movement and play into the reading of poetry, the first project—a handmade Jacob’s ladder haiku mashup—was a collaboration with esteemed haiku artist Ben Moeller Gaa & visual artist Ron Isom. This work is held at the American Haiku Archives in Sacramento, CA.

JOSS BARTON is a writer, journalist, and spoken word performance artist exploring and documenting queer and trans* life, love, and liberation. Her work blends femme-fever dreams over the soundtrack of the American nightmare. Combining prose poetry, non-fiction confessional essays, drag artistry, and spoken word stage performances, Joss examines the myriad states of queer trans womanhoods from historical, political, and pop cultural identities of death, desires, dreams, and disco.