Saint Louis Poetry Center

EVENT CANCELLED - Poemtober: Halloween Open Mic
2025-10-30 19:00 (America/Chicago) | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
EVENT CANCELLATION NOTICE:

Due to illness, this event has been canceled. Have a safe and fun Halloween!

This event will be held in-person at High Low.

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to partner with Inktober this year to bring you Poemtober. In conjunction with Poemtober, Saint Louis Poetry Center invites you to a special Halloween open mic!

EVENT INFO

Doors open at 6:30pm.Reading begins at 7:00pmCostumes encouraged

ABOUT THE PARTY

Come share your Poemtober poems at our Halloween open mic, and bring your friends! Featuring:

Poemtober Open Mic

Music and Costumes

Snacks & Cash Bar

You do not need to participate in the open mic to attend the event.

ABOUT POEMTOBER

Each day throughout October, we post a new word prompt to our social media channels. Use that word to inspire your writing, and then come share your work at this community reading. We are here to support and encourage writers. We hope this project helps us all shift from that summertime haze into a place of creative generation.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

RESCHEDULED – Sunday Workshop: Gabrielle Calvocoressi
2025-11-16 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
EVENT CANCELLATION / RESCHEDULE NOTICE:

Due to travel complications, this workshop has been rescheduled to March 22, 2026.

Our November workshop will now take place with Elizabeth Hoover. Details here.

PHOTO CREDIT: Alyssa LaFaro (Calvocoressi)

In conjunction with our November Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Gabrielle Calvocoressi for the November Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 12 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Wednesday, November 12

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: November 12, 2025

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

This workshop will be a generative workshop.

ABOUT THE POET

GABRIELLE CALVOCORESSI is the author of The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart, Apocalyptic Swing (a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize), and Rocket Fantastic, winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Calvocoressi is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including a Stegner Fellowship and Jones Lectureship from Stanford University; a Rona Jaffe Woman Writer’s Award; a Lannan Foundation residency in Marfa, TX; the Bernard F. Conners Prize from The Paris Review; and a residency from the Civitella di Ranieri Foundation, among others. Calvocoressi’s poems have been published or are forthcoming in numerous magazines and journals including The Baffler, The New York Times, POETRY, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Tin House, and The New Yorker. Calvocoressi is an Editor at Large at Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poetry Editor at Southern Cultures. Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Old East Durham, NC, where joy, compassion, and social justice are at the center of their personal and poetic practice. Their new collection of poetry, The New Economy, is a finalist for the 2025 National Book Award in Poetry.

VENUE

Sunday Workshop: Elizabeth Hoover
2025-11-16 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person.

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Elizabeth Hoover for the November Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Wednesday, November 12

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: November 12, 2025

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

This workshop will be a generative workshop.

ABOUT THE POET

ELIZABETH HOOVER is the author of the archive is all in present tense, winner of the 2021 Barrow Street Book Prize. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in the North American Review, Kenyon Review, and StoryQuarterly. She teaches in the English Department at Webster University in St. Louis.

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RESCHEDULED – Observable Readings: Gabrielle Calvocoressi & Claude Canese Jarboe
2025-11-17 19:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
EVENT CANCELLATION / RESCHEDULE NOTICE:

Due to travel complications, this event has been rescheduled to March 23, 2026.

PHOTO CREDIT: Alyssa LaFaro (Calvocoressi)

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poets Gabrielle Calvocoressi and Claude Canese Jarboe for Observable Readings.

Books available for purchase from Left Bank Books.

ABOUT THE POETS

GABRIELLE CALVOCORESSI is the author of The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart, Apocalyptic Swing (a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize), and Rocket Fantastic, winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Calvocoressi is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including a Stegner Fellowship and Jones Lectureship from Stanford University; a Rona Jaffe Woman Writer’s Award; a Lannan Foundation residency in Marfa, TX; the Bernard F. Conners Prize from The Paris Review; and a residency from the Civitella di Ranieri Foundation, among others. Calvocoressi’s poems have been published or are forthcoming in numerous magazines and journals including The Baffler, The New York Times, POETRY, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Tin House, and The New Yorker. Calvocoressi is an Editor at Large at Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poetry Editor at Southern Cultures. Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Old East Durham, NC, where joy, compassion, and social justice are at the center of their personal and poetic practice. Their new collection of poetry, The New Economy, is a finalist for the 2025 National Book Award in Poetry.

CLAUDE CANESE JARBOE is the author of SISSY (Garden-Door Press, 2024). Jarboe is the 2025-2026 Editorial Fellow and managing editor of Pleiades at University of Central Missouri, and is a recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Tallgrass Artist Residency, and Nō Studios. Their work has recently appeared in venues such as POETRY, American Poetry Review, and Traffic East, to name a few. Born and raised on a farm in rural southeastern Kansas, Jarboe currently resides near Kansas City with their fiancée, Andi.

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The Observable Readings series is supported in part by:

SLCL Presents: Billy Collins
2025-11-23 19:00 | St. Louis County Library – Clark Family Branch, 1640 S. Lindbergh Blvd., Saint Louis, Missouri, 63131-3598, United States
in conversation with Erin Quick

This is a ticketed event. The reading will be held in-person at St. Louis County Library – Clark Family Branch.

The St. Louis County Library Foundation, the Favorite Author Series, Left Bank Books and Saint Louis Poetry Center present former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins, author of Dog Show: Poems. In conversation with Erin Quick, executive director of Saint Louis Poetry Center.

New York Times bestselling author and former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins captures the essence and mystery of dogs in this special collection of poems inspired by our beloved companions, with striking watercolor canine portraits by Pamela Sztybel.

TICKET INFO

Tickets can be purchased through Eventbrite. Seating will be offered on a first-come, first-served basis. A book signing line will follow the presentation. Doors open at 6:00 p.m.

INDIVIDUAL TICKET – $28Admits ONE and includes one copy of “Dog Show”

OR

PACKAGE TICKET – $35Admits TWO and includes one copy of “Dog Show”

EVENT INFO

Doors at 6:00 p.m.

Books available from Left Bank Books

ABOUT THE BOOK

DOG SHOW: POEMS

Billy Collins’s Dog Show celebrates the joy of our canine best friends, honoring the love we feel for the animals who play such vital roles in our lives. In twenty-five poems, Collins distills the many ways dogs warm our hearts, from the happiness we experience as we watch a dog run unencumbered by our burdens, to the silliness of cradling a dog in our arms as we step on the scale together. Turning his inimitable eye and ear to the complexities of dog behavior, Collins ponders all that these winning creatures give us and what we learn from them about ourselves.

For more than four decades Collins has delighted readers with his insight, wit, and clear poetic voice. In Dog Show, “America’s favorite poet” ( The Wall Street Journal) illuminates America’s favorite pet (sorry, cat lovers). Accompanied by Pamela Sztybel’s watercolors, which effortlessly depict a dog’s humble grace, Dog Show reveals the profound role these majestic animals play in our lives and the meaning they give us.

ABOUT THE POET

BILLY COLLINS is the author of fifteen collections of poetry, including Sailing Alone Around the Room, Aimless Love and, most recently, Water, Water. He served two terms as United State Poet Laureate and is a former Distinguished Professor of English at Lehman College and New York State Poet. He is a New York Public Library Literary Lion and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is currently “between dogs,” his most recent an Australian Shepherd mix named Jeannine. He lives in Winter Park, Florida, with his wife Suzannah.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

An Evening of Emily Dickinson
2025-12-08 19:00 | Focal Point, 2720 Sutton, Maplewood, MO, 63143, United States
Celebrating the Birthday and Poetry of Emily Dickinsona collaboration with Babler Poetry Society

In celebration of Emily Dickinson’s birthday, the Babler Poetry Society, in collaboration with Saint Louis Poetry Center, is delighted to present An Evening of Emily Dickinson. Known for her originality and sly wit, Dickinson shaped American poetry with her short, sharp lines and gift for image-making. Her poems, by turns playful and mysterious, continue to surprise and inspire readers around the world. Join us as we honor one of literature’s most brilliant and unconventional voices.

EVENT INFO

Doors Open & Light Bites: 6:30–7:00 pm

Reading & Discussion: 7:00–8:00 pm

RSVP is encouraged but not required.

ABOUT THE READERS

DANA LEVIN is the author of five books poetry. Her latest is Now Do You Know Where You Are (Copper Canyon), a 2022 New York Times Notable Book and NPR “Book We Love.” She is a grateful recipient of honors from the National Endowment for the Arts, PEN, and the Library of Congress, as well as from the Whiting and Guggenheim Foundations. Levin teaches for the Bennington Writing Seminars, the MFA program at Bennington College, and serves as Distinguished Writer in Residence at Maryville University in St. Louis. Her first book of prose, House of Feels, comes out from Graywolf Press in 2027.

MELISSA QUALLS has taught literature, composition, and creative writing in the English department at Lindenwood University since 2002. She earned her MFA from Lindenwood University in 2018 and is an active member of Saint Louis Poetry Center, Babler Poetry Society, and Poetry in the Woods (2023, 2024, & 2025). Most recently, her poem “They look so small, lying there” won Honorable Mention in the 2024 Wednesday Club Original Poetry competition, she has published two poems “For Nora” and “Wednesday Afternoon, April 4th” in Nine Mile Literary Magazine (Fall 2024), and her poem “Wabi Sabi” won first place in Saturday Writers “Anything Goes” Contest (March 2025).

TEDDY NORRIS is a retired professor of English who taught composition, poetry, and creative writing for two decades and edited a community college literary journal for five years. Her work has appeared in various journals, including Adanna, Broad River Review, Cable Street, Flying South, Kakalak, Little Patuxent Review, and The Switchgrass Review. She is the author of two chapbooks, Pillars of Salt and In Transit, published by Finishing Line Press and The Poetry Box, respectively.

KRISTIN EMANUEL is a PhD candidate researching poetry and poetics at Washington University in St. Louis. Her debut poetry collection, Birdwatching in the 4th Dimension, was recently selected by Shann Ray as the winner of the 2025 Emma Howell Rising Poet Prize, and it will be published by Willow Springs Books in early 2026. Poems from this collection have appeared or are forthcoming in Ecotone, Boston Review, and Poetry Northwest.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

Babler Poetry Society

VENUE

EVENT ORGANIZERS

Sunday Workshop: Registration Due
2026-01-16 23:59 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Melody S. Gee for the January Sunday Workshop! This will be a generative workshop.

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

This workshop will be a generative workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, January 16

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: January 16, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

MELODY S. GEE is the author of We Carry Smoke and Paper: Essays on the Grief and Hope of Conversion (University of Iowa Press, 2024), finalist for the Hudson Prize. She is also the author of three books of poetry, The Convert’s Heart is Good to Eat, The Dead in Daylight, and Each Crumbling House, winner of the 2010 Perugia Press Prize. Melody is the recipient of Kundiman fellowships in poetry and fiction, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Award, Artist Support Grants from the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis, and two Pushcart Prize nominations, among other honors. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear recently in Soapberry Review, Commonweal, Essay Daily, and Lantern Review.

Born in Taiwan and raised in Cerritos, California, Melody is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of New Mexico. She has taught writing at Purdue University, Southwestern Illinois College, and St. Louis Community College, and currently works as a communications strategist. She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with her husband and daughters.

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Sunday Workshop: Melody S. Gee
2026-01-18 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

PHOTO CREDIT: C. Smyth Photography

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Melody S. Gee for the January Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, January 16

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: January 16, 2026

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

In this generative workshop, participants will explore their writing processes through a variety of guided prompts. Together, we’ll experiment with approach and generate new draft material in a supportive, low-pressure space.

ABOUT THE POET

MELODY S. GEE is the author of We Carry Smoke and Paper: Essays on the Grief and Hope of Conversion (University of Iowa Press, 2024), finalist for the Hudson Prize. She is also the author of three books of poetry, The Convert’s Heart is Good to Eat, The Dead in Daylight, and Each Crumbling House, winner of the 2010 Perugia Press Prize. Melody is the recipient of Kundiman fellowships in poetry and fiction, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Award, Artist Support Grants from the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis, and two Pushcart Prize nominations, among other honors. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear recently in Soapberry Review, Commonweal, Essay Daily, and Lantern Review.

Born in Taiwan and raised in Cerritos, California, Melody is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of New Mexico. She has taught writing at Purdue University, Southwestern Illinois College, and St. Louis Community College, and currently works as a communications strategist. She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with her husband and daughters.

VENUE

Poetry at the Point: Kamau Walker & Lydia Golitz
2026-01-27 19:30 | Focal Point, 2720 Sutton, Maplewood, MO, 63143, United States
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.

Poetry at the Point welcomes poets Kamau Walker and Lydia Golitz.

ABOUT THE POETS

KAMAU WALKER is a poet from St. Louis, Missouri, currently enrolled in his third year as an MFA poetry candidate at the University of Virginia. He previously received a Bachelor of Science in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Yale University and spent time before his MFA program working as a high school teacher at John Burroughs School in St. Louis. He continues his love of ecology through his writing while also exploring community, love, music, and the importance of the aforementioned in the presence of environmental degradation and systemically permitted/propagated discrimination and violence, with the hope of understanding himself and the world around him.

LYDIA GOLITZ is a second-year MFA student at Washington University in St. Louis. She was born and raised in Chicago. Her work is published in Black Warrior Review, Seneca Review, Washington Square Review, and elsewhere.

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Sunday Workshop: Registration Due (Coleman)
2026-02-13 23:59 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
In conjunction with our February Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Aaron Coleman for Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop focused on attention and gratitude.

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

How We Attune to Gratitude

In this workshop we will explore how poets cultivate an intimate sense of attention: attuning to the complexity of the world(s) around us and the world(s) within us. We’ll dwell together with poems and writing prompts that cultivate our sense of careful attention and we’ll contemplate together what that attention makes possible, especially gratitude, especially communal connection, and maybe even joy.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, February 13

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this special event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: February 13, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

AARON COLEMAN is a poet, translator, educator, and scholar of the African Diaspora. He is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, Cave Canem, the Fulbright Program, and the American Literary Translators Association. His debut poetry collection, Threat Come Close, was the winner of the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award, and his chapbook, St. Trigger, won the Button Poetry Prize. He is also the translator of Afro-Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén’s 1967 collection, The Great Zoo, selected for the Phoenix Poet Series by University of Chicago Press. His poems, essays, and translations have appeared in publications including The New York Times, Boston Review, Callaloo, and Poetry Magazine. From Metro-Detroit, Coleman has lived and worked with youth in locations including Spain, South Africa, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kalamazoo. He is an assistant professor of English and Comparative Literature in the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan.

VENUE

Sunday Workshop: Registration Due (Kuipers)
2026-02-13 23:59 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
In conjunction with our February Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Keetje Kuipers for Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop focused on the poetics of humility.

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

A Poetics of Humility: Writing Worm-Level Poems

What might it be like for our poems to get down in the dirt, to put ourselves and our poems at worm level? In this class, we will concentrate on writing towards the places in our poems where humility manifests itself as a clarity of vision of ourselves in relation to the world. We’ll accomplish this through reading and writing that asks each of us to create a poetics of humility that yields not a poem of regret but of wonder—at change, at realization, at the endless, humble prospect of still-to-be-seen possibility.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, February 13

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this special event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: February 13, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

KEETJE KUIPERS is the author of four books of poetry from BOA Editions, and the Editor-in-Chief of Poetry Northwest. Her collection Lonely Women Make Good Lovers is the winner of the Isabella Gardner Poetry Award, and was called “elegant, earthy, [and] pertinent,” by Marilyn Hacker. Her first book, Beautiful in the Mouth, won the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. Her subsequent books, The Keys to the Jail and All Its Charms, include poems honored with publication in the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Keetje’s poetry and prose have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, POETRY, American Poetry Review, and over a hundred other publications. She was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, a Bread Loaf Fellow, the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident, a former board member and Vice President of the National Book Critics Circle, and is the recipient of a 2025 NEA fellowship. She lives in Montana with her wife and children.

VENUE

Sunday Workshop: Aaron Coleman
2026-02-15 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

PHOTO CREDIT: Marcus Jackson

In conjunction with our February Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Aaron Coleman for Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop focused on attention and gratitude.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, February 13

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this special event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: February 13, 2026

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

How We Attune to Gratitude

In this workshop we will explore how poets cultivate an intimate sense of attention: attuning to the complexity of the world(s) around us and the world(s) within us. We’ll dwell together with poems and writing prompts that cultivate our sense of careful attention and we’ll contemplate together what that attention makes possible, especially gratitude, especially communal connection, and maybe even joy.

ABOUT THE POET

AARON COLEMAN is a poet, translator, educator, and scholar of the African Diaspora. He is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, Cave Canem, the Fulbright Program, and the American Literary Translators Association. His debut poetry collection, Threat Come Close, was the winner of the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award, and his chapbook, St. Trigger, won the Button Poetry Prize. He is also the translator of Afro-Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén’s 1967 collection, The Great Zoo, selected for the Phoenix Poet Series by University of Chicago Press. His poems, essays, and translations have appeared in publications including The New York Times, Boston Review, Callaloo, and Poetry Magazine. From Metro-Detroit, Coleman has lived and worked with youth in locations including Spain, South Africa, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kalamazoo. He is an assistant professor of English and Comparative Literature in the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan.

VENUE

Sunday Workshop: Keetje Kuipers
2026-02-15 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

In conjunction with our February Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Keetje Kuipers for Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop focused on the poetics of humility.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Friday, February 13

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this special event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: February 13, 2026

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

A Poetics of Humility: Writing Worm-Level Poems

What might it be like for our poems to get down in the dirt, to put ourselves and our poems at worm level? In this class, we will concentrate on writing towards the places in our poems where humility manifests itself as a clarity of vision of ourselves in relation to the world. We’ll accomplish this through reading and writing that asks each of us to create a poetics of humility that yields not a poem of regret but of wonder—at change, at realization, at the endless, humble prospect of still-to-be-seen possibility.

ABOUT THE POET

KEETJE KUIPERS is the author of four books of poetry from BOA Editions, and the Editor-in-Chief of Poetry Northwest. Her collection Lonely Women Make Good Lovers is the winner of the Isabella Gardner Poetry Award, and was called “elegant, earthy, [and] pertinent,” by Marilyn Hacker. Her first book, Beautiful in the Mouth, won the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. Her subsequent books, The Keys to the Jail and All Its Charms, include poems honored with publication in the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Keetje’s poetry and prose have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, POETRY, American Poetry Review, and over a hundred other publications. She was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, a Bread Loaf Fellow, the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident, a former board member and Vice President of the National Book Critics Circle, and is the recipient of a 2025 NEA fellowship. She lives in Montana with her wife and children.

VENUE

Observable Readings: Keetje Kuipers & Aaron Coleman
2026-02-16 19:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
The reading will be held in-person at High Low.

PHOTO CREDIT: Marcus Jackson (Coleman)

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poets Keetje Kuipers and Aaron Coleman for Observable Readings.

Books available for purchase from Left Bank Books.

ABOUT THE POETS

KEETJE KUIPERS is the author of four books of poetry from BOA Editions, and the Editor-in-Chief of Poetry Northwest. Her collection Lonely Women Make Good Lovers is the winner of the Isabella Gardner Poetry Award, and was called “elegant, earthy, [and] pertinent,” by Marilyn Hacker. Her first book, Beautiful in the Mouth, won the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. Her subsequent books, The Keys to the Jail and All Its Charms, include poems honored with publication in the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Keetje’s poetry and prose have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, POETRY, American Poetry Review, and over a hundred other publications. She was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, a Bread Loaf Fellow, the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident, a former board member and Vice President of the National Book Critics Circle, and is the recipient of a 2025 NEA fellowship. She lives in Montana with her wife and children.

AARON COLEMAN is a poet, translator, educator, and scholar of the African Diaspora. He is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, Cave Canem, the Fulbright Program, and the American Literary Translators Association. His debut poetry collection, Threat Come Close, was the winner of the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award, and his chapbook, St. Trigger, won the Button Poetry Prize. He is also the translator of Afro-Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén’s 1967 collection, The Great Zoo, selected for the Phoenix Poet Series by University of Chicago Press. His poems, essays, and translations have appeared in publications including The New York Times, Boston Review, Callaloo, and Poetry Magazine. From Metro-Detroit, Coleman has lived and worked with youth in locations including Spain, South Africa, Chicago, St. Louis, and Kalamazoo. He is an assistant professor of English and Comparative Literature in the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan.

VENUE

The Observable Readings series is supported in part by:

Sunday Workshop: Submissions Due
2026-03-11 23:59 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Mary Jo Bang for the March Sunday Workshop! This will be a traditional / revision workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 12 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Submissions due by Wednesday, March 11

Submit only one poem, one page in length

Provide name, mailing address, phone number and email address

Those submitting poems are expected to attend the workshop

You do not need to submit a poem to attend

If you need to attend virtually, please indicate this is your registration email

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org*Please attach poem as separate Word or PDF document. We are not accepting mailed submissions at this time. We apologize for any inconvenience.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: March 11, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

MARY JO BANG has published nine collections of poetry, including Elegy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, and translations of Dante’s Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. She teaches at Washington University in Saint Louis.

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Sunday Workshop: Mary Jo Bang
2026-03-15 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Mary Jo Bang for the March Sunday Workshop! This will be a traditional / revision workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 12 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Submissions due by Wednesday, March 11

Submit only one poem, one page in length

Provide name, mailing address, phone number and email address

Those submitting poems are expected to attend the workshop

You do not need to submit a poem to attend

If you need to attend virtually, please indicate this is your registration email

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org*Please attach poem as separate Word or PDF document. We are not accepting mailed submissions at this time. We apologize for any inconvenience.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: March 11, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

MARY JO BANG has published nine collections of poetry, including Elegy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, and translations of Dante’s Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. She teaches at Washington University in Saint Louis.

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WORKSHOP FULL - Sunday Workshop: Gabrielle Calvocoressi
2026-03-22 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
WORKSHOP REGISTRATION UPDATE:

This workshop is currently at capacity. If you would like to be added to our waitlist, please email us: sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

PHOTO CREDIT: Alyssa LaFaro

In conjunction with our March Observable Readings, Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poet Gabrielle Calvocoressi for a special additional March Sunday Workshop! This workshop will be a generative workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 25 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Registration is due by Wednesday, March 18

This is a generative workshop in which participants will draft & revise their own poems

No poem submissions will be accepted for this event

Poets will not review manuscripts or provide feedback ahead of time

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org

REGISTRATION DEADLINE: March 18, 2026

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP

This workshop will be a generative workshop.

ABOUT THE POET

GABRIELLE CALVOCORESSI is the author of The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart, Apocalyptic Swing (a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize), and Rocket Fantastic, winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Calvocoressi is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including a Stegner Fellowship and Jones Lectureship from Stanford University; a Rona Jaffe Woman Writer’s Award; a Lannan Foundation residency in Marfa, TX; the Bernard F. Conners Prize from The Paris Review; and a residency from the Civitella di Ranieri Foundation, among others. Calvocoressi’s poems have been published or are forthcoming in numerous magazines and journals including The Baffler, The New York Times, POETRY, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Tin House, and The New Yorker. Calvocoressi is an Editor at Large at Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poetry Editor at Southern Cultures. Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Old East Durham, NC, where joy, compassion, and social justice are at the center of their personal and poetic practice. Their new collection of poetry, The New Economy, is a finalist for the 2025 National Book Award in Poetry.

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Observable Readings: Gabrielle Calvocoressi & Claude Canese Jarboe
2026-03-23 19:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
The reading will be held in-person at High Low.

PHOTO CREDIT: Alyssa LaFaro (Calvocoressi)

Saint Louis Poetry Center is thrilled to welcome poets Gabrielle Calvocoressi and Claude Canese Jarboe for Observable Readings.

Books available for purchase from Left Bank Books.

ABOUT THE POETS

GABRIELLE CALVOCORESSI is the author of The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart, Apocalyptic Swing (a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize), and Rocket Fantastic, winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Calvocoressi is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including a Stegner Fellowship and Jones Lectureship from Stanford University; a Rona Jaffe Woman Writer’s Award; a Lannan Foundation residency in Marfa, TX; the Bernard F. Conners Prize from The Paris Review; and a residency from the Civitella di Ranieri Foundation, among others. Calvocoressi’s poems have been published or are forthcoming in numerous magazines and journals including The Baffler, The New York Times, POETRY, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Tin House, and The New Yorker. Calvocoressi is an Editor at Large at Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poetry Editor at Southern Cultures. Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Old East Durham, NC, where joy, compassion, and social justice are at the center of their personal and poetic practice. Their new collection of poetry, The New Economy, is a finalist for the 2025 National Book Award in Poetry.

CLAUDE CANESE JARBOE is the author of SISSY (Garden-Door Press, 2024). Jarboe is the 2025-2026 Editorial Fellow and managing editor of Pleiades at University of Central Missouri, and is a recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Tallgrass Artist Residency, and Nō Studios. Their work has recently appeared in venues such as POETRY, American Poetry Review, and Traffic East, to name a few. Born and raised on a farm in rural southeastern Kansas, Jarboe currently resides near Kansas City with their fiancée, Andi.

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The Observable Readings series is supported in part by:

Poetry at the Point: Angel C. Dye & Lindsay McHugh
2026-03-24 19:30 | Focal Point, 2720 Sutton, Maplewood, MO, 63143, United States
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.

Poetry at the Point welcomes poets Angel C. Dye and Lindsay McHugh.

ABOUT THE POETS

ANGEL C. DYE is a poet and professor of African American Literature with roots in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Dallas-Ft. Worth, Texas. Dye received her B.A. in English from Howard University, her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Kentucky, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in English Literatures from Rutgers. She is the author of two poetry collections entitled BREATHE (2021) and My Mouth a Constant Prayer (2023), and her work has appeared widely in journals and magazines. Dye teaches courses on Black women’s writing, Harlem Renaissance Literature & Culture, and more at Southern Illinois University – Edwardsville.

LINDSAY McHUGH is a poet and journalist based in St. Louis. Her debut chapbook, un-memory, was published by Bottlecap Press in 2025. She publishes journalism under the byline Lindsay Toler.

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Left Bank Books Presents: Aiden Heung
2026-04-01 18:00 | Left Bank Books, 399 N Euclid Ave, St. Louis, MO, 63108, United States
in conversation with poet Mary Jo Bang

This reading will be held in-person at Left Bank Books.

A Poetry Month Celebration! We are thrilled to partner with Left Bank Books to welcome Aiden Heung and Mary Jo Bang for a night of poetry celebrating the new release of All There Is to Lose by Aiden Heung. Heung holds an MFA in creative writing from Washington University. He is the 2024 winner of the Four Way Books Levis Prize in Poetry and a finalist for the DISQUIET Prize, a winner of the International Proverse Poetry Prize, and the recipient of 2025 Elinor Benedict Poetry Prize, selected by Diane Seuss. Join us for a reading and book signing.

“What I love most in this book is how the images and details carry emotion via perspective, while lyrical in turn of phrase. Often understated, pared down, the poetry lives here in specifics that emote: A mother scrubs clean the headstone carvings, a man remembers laughing after he watched his father enter the river twenty years ago, travelers sleep with their heads on greasy bags. Each detail carries an undertow of emotion.” – Ilya Kaminsky, Judge of the 2024 Four Way Books Levis Prize in Poetry

EVENT INFO

Books available from Left Bank Books

Curbside pick-up, in-store pick-up, and shipping available

RSVP is encouraged

ABOUT THE BOOK

ALL THERE IS TO LOSE

Marking Aiden Heung’s debut collection, All There Is to Lose is the 2024 winner of the Four Way Books Levis Prize in Poetry. The selecting judge, National Book Award Finalist Ilya Kaminsky, praises the resonant particularities and depth of feeling found in these poems, which convert “elegy [into] its driving force.” Poet and Critic Felicity Plunkett observes, “Dreams and memory move through these porous, venturesome poems. The spectral jostles with the sensual to tell ‘a story in which I could be found.’ Achily tender, they open to light, love and the jab of a joke.” Poet David Tait notes, “Unsettling and luminous, the poems preserve the memory of Village 915: its volatile seasons and hard-worn inhabitants, its headstones, spirits, and myriad forms of water. Here you’ll find not only poems of lyrical beauty, but of grim exactness.” The result is a stunning achievement of a first book, what Kaminsky identifies as an exemplar of “that ages-old mode of poetry wherein the poet uses language to break bread with the dead, to bring them back to life, if only for the moment, for a portion of the moment, an instant, before the line breaks.” Channeling the poet as medium, “I am the tension on the bow that draws the arrow,” Heung writes in “Epilogue.” “To lose myself — that is my destiny.”

ABOUT THE POETS

AIDEN HEUNG (he/they) is a Chinese poet born in a Tibetan Autonomous town. After working as a traveling salesman for years, he recently relocated to St. Louis, USA. His poems have been published in Australian Poetry Journal, Harvard Review, The Kenyon Review, The Yale Review, 声韵诗刊 (Voice and Verse Poetry Magazine), and many other places. He is a finalist for the DISQUIET Prize, a winner of the International Proverse Poetry Prize, and the recipient of 2025 Elinor Benedict Poetry Prize, selected by Diane Seuss. He and his work have been generously supported by Varuna, The National Writers’ House (Australia) and Swatch Art Peace Hotel residency (Switzerland/ Shanghai, China). He holds an MFA in creative writing from Washington University.

MARY JO BANG has published nine collections of poetry, including Elegy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, and translations of Dante’s Inferno and Purgatorio. She teaches at Washington University in Saint Louis.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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HIGH NOON: The Lines That Brought Us Here
2026-04-09 12:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Celebrating 80 Years with Saint Louis Poetry Center

In celebration of National Poetry Month, Erin Quick, Executive Director of Saint Louis Poetry Center, presents a lunchtime talk marking the organization’s 80th anniversary.

EVENT INFO

High Noon offers free cultural and artistic programming, during your lunch hour! The High Noon series features St. Louis thought leaders from across the arts, cultural, and educational spectrum. Spend a lunch hour enjoying presentations and performances in a friendly, relaxed atmosphere – take a break, and feel free to bring your lunch!

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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Sunday Workshop: Submissions Due
2026-04-17 23:59 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Saint Louis Poetry Center welcomes poet Teresa Dzieglewicz for the April Sunday Workshop! This will be a traditional / revision workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Submissions due by Friday, April 17

Submit only one poem, one page in length

Provide name, mailing address, phone number and email address

Those submitting poems are expected to attend the workshop

You do not need to submit a poem to attend

If you need to attend virtually, please indicate this is your registration email

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org*Please attach poem as separate Word or PDF document. We are not accepting mailed submissions at this time. We apologize for any inconvenience.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: April 17, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

TERESA DZIEGLEWICZ is a poet, educator, and lover of rivers and prairies. She is a fellow with Black Earth Institute, a Poet-in-Residence at the Chicago Poetry Center, and part of the founding team of Mni Wichoni Nakicizin Wounspe (Defenders of the Water School). With Natasha Mijares, she organizes “Watershed: Ways of Seeing the Chicago River”. Her first book of poetry, Something Small of How to See a River was selected by Tyehimba Jess for the Dorset Prize (Tupelo Press). Her first children’s book, Belonging, co-written with Kimimila Locke, is forthcoming from Chronicle Books. She has won a Pushcart Prize, Best New Poets, the Gingko Prize, the Auburn Witness Prize, and the Palette Poetry Prize and has received fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, Community of Writers at Tahoe, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center, and Brooklyn Poets. Teresa lives with her family in Chicago, on Potawatomi land.

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Sunday Workshop: Teresa Dzieglewicz
2026-04-19 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
This workshop will be held in-person at High Low.

Saint Louis Poetry Center welcomes poet Teresa Dzieglewicz for the April Sunday Workshop! This will be a traditional / revision workshop.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Please note: this workshop is limited to 15 participants. Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Submissions due by Friday, April 17

Submit only one poem, one page in length

Provide name, mailing address, phone number and email address

Those submitting poems are expected to attend the workshop

You do not need to submit a poem to attend

If you need to attend virtually, please indicate this is your registration email

To register, email:sunday.workshop@stlouispoetrycenter.org*Please attach poem as separate Word or PDF document. We are not accepting mailed submissions at this time. We apologize for any inconvenience.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: April 17, 2026

ABOUT THE POET

TERESA DZIEGLEWICZ is a poet, educator, and lover of rivers and prairies. She is a fellow with Black Earth Institute, a Poet-in-Residence at the Chicago Poetry Center, and part of the founding team of Mni Wichoni Nakicizin Wounspe (Defenders of the Water School). With Natasha Mijares, she organizes “Watershed: Ways of Seeing the Chicago River”. Her first book of poetry, Something Small of How to See a River was selected by Tyehimba Jess for the Dorset Prize (Tupelo Press). Her first children’s book, Belonging, co-written with Kimimila Locke, is forthcoming from Chronicle Books. She has won a Pushcart Prize, Best New Poets, the Gingko Prize, the Auburn Witness Prize, and the Palette Poetry Prize and has received fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, Community of Writers at Tahoe, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center, and Brooklyn Poets. Teresa lives with her family in Chicago, on Potawatomi land.

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Observable Readings: Teresa Dzieglewicz & C. Russell Price
2026-04-20 19:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
The reading will be held in-person at High Low.

Saint Louis Poetry Center welcomes poets Teresa Dzieglewicz and C. Russell Price for Observable Readings.

Books available for purchase from Left Bank Books.

ABOUT THE POETS

TERESA DZIEGLEWICZ is a poet, educator, and lover of rivers and prairies. She is a fellow with Black Earth Institute, a Poet-in-Residence at the Chicago Poetry Center, and part of the founding team of Mni Wichoni Nakicizin Wounspe (Defenders of the Water School). With Natasha Mijares, she organizes “Watershed: Ways of Seeing the Chicago River”. Her first book of poetry, Something Small of How to See a River was selected by Tyehimba Jess for the Dorset Prize (Tupelo Press). Her first children’s book, Belonging, co-written with Kimimila Locke, is forthcoming from Chronicle Books. She has won a Pushcart Prize, Best New Poets, the Gingko Prize, the Auburn Witness Prize, and the Palette Poetry Prize and has received fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, Community of Writers at Tahoe, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center, and Brooklyn Poets. Teresa lives with her family in Chicago, on Potawatomi land.

C. RUSSELL PRICE is the author of oh, you thought this was a date?!: Apocalypse Poems and Tonight, We Fuck the Trailer Park Out of Each Other. Their newest collection Bisquick: An American Seance will be published in August 2026 by Northwestern University Press. They are a poet in residence at the Chicago Poetry Center, a Lambda Fellow, a Ragdale Fellow, Literary Death Match champion, and two-time Lit 50 honoree.

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The Observable Readings series is supported in part by:

SLICE & SLPC Present: Sip & Scribe
2026-04-25 12:00 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Coffee and composition in community!

Hang out, write things, share your work. Join SLICE and the Saint Louis Poetry Center for an afternoon of writing!

Do you love SLICE and the idea of Drink & Draws, but your preferred medium is typically textual? Well, fret not, as this year SLICE is proud to introduce Sip & Scribe, in collaboration with the Saint Louis Poetry Center! Grab a cup of coffee at Blueprint before coming upstairs for semi-structured writing time and share your poems, short stories, novel excerpts, and more. Come hang out and write things surrounded by SLICE friends.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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Poetry at the Point: Miguel Barretto-García & Nicole Brunette
2026-04-28 19:30 | Focal Point, 2720 Sutton, Maplewood, MO, 63143, United States
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.

Poetry at the Point welcomes poets Miguel Barretto-García & Nicole Brunette.

ABOUT THE POETS

MIGUEL BARRETTO-GARCÍA is a spoken word performer and neuroscientist in St. Louis. Their poems have appeared or have been in accepted in The Iowa Review, Poetry Northwest, & Change, Wildness, Rhino Poetry, and Rattle, among others. They have previously performed in the spoken word and poetry slam circuits in Switzerland and the US, notably at the Zurich Theatre Spectacle, The Chicago Filipino American Theatre Festival, and Goodie House in St. Louis. They completed their PhD in Neuroecoconomics at the University of Zürich and they are currently a postdoctoral researcher at Washington University in St. Louis.

NICOLE BRUNETTE is a St. Louis native with a lifelong fascination for the things that scare her most. When she isn’t researching unsettling topics or working as a bookseller, she writes about the strange and beautiful world of bugs. Nicole recently completed her MFA, finishing her poetry thesis Anamnesis, a collection that blends her earlier work with original art and photography. Her writing has appeared in several online, music-centered magazines.

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The Poetry at the Point series is supported in part by:

SLICE & SLPC Present: Sip & Scribe
2026-05-30 12:00 - 13:30, 2026-06-20 12:00 - 13:30 | High Low, 3301 Washington Ave, Saint Louis, MO, 63103
Coffee and composition in community!

Hang out, write things, share your work. Join SLICE and the Saint Louis Poetry Center for an afternoon of writing!

SLICE and the Saint Louis Poetry Center are happy to co-host monthly Sip & Scribes at the High Low on the last Saturday of the month, 12-1:30 p.m.! Bring your laptop or your notebooks, grab a cup of coffee at Blueprint, and join your fellow poets, authors, and lyricists for semi-structured writing time and an opportunity to share your work with friends.

GUIDELINES & REGISTRATION

Registration is required, and is first-come, first-served.

Those registering are expected to attend the workshop.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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Glendal Wallace: The Words We Wear
2026-06-03 18:00 | St. Louis County Library – Clark Family Branch, 1640 S. Lindbergh Blvd., Saint Louis, Missouri, 63131-3598, United States
This reading will be held in-person at St. Louis County Library – Clark Family Branch.

Join us at the St. Louis County Library – Clark Family Branch for an evening of inspiration with local author and poet Glendal Wallace, for the launch of her book The Words We Wear.

Refreshments provided.

ABOUT THE BOOK

THE WORDS WE WEAR

Wallace hits all the high notes well and avoids the dangers, and that is high praise. “Words Take Their Own Journey” gives a clear vision of how the musicality and drive of oral tradition can land, delicately and with gentle authority. The poem speaks out to a wide audience but feels personal. “Weep America II” is such a fine poem, exploring in one compressed space the pain, self-deceit, ignorance that we all suffer from being “stuck” where we are now. It’s the poem all of us need desperately, right now.

– Rebecca Ellis, Distinguished Poet and Master Naturalist, University of Illinois

ABOUT THE POET

GLENDAL WALLACE is the author of three poetry collections, Jewels of Fillmore, Unconnected Thoughts, and The Words We Wear. An educator for over thirty years, she has published essays, short stories and in anthologies that inspire, encourage and educate writers at all levels. She lives with her family in St. Louis where she continues to nurture her creative spirit from enjoying blissful walks and scenic cruise vacations.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

Friends of Glendal Wallace

MoBot & SLPC Present: Kristin Emanuel & Amie Whittemore
2026-06-10 19:00 | Missouri Botanical Garden – Bayer Center, 4500 Shaw Blvd., Saint Louis, MO, 63110, United States
a collaboration with Missouri Botanical Garden

Join Missouri Botanical Garden and Saint Louis Poetry Center in celebrating the launch of the debut poetry collection by Kristin Emanuel, who will be reading with Amie Whittemore. Copies of Birdwatching in the 4th Dimension and Nest of Matches will be available for purchase from the poets. All proceeds from Kristin’s book sales will benefit STAR – St. Louis Avian Rescue.

After the poetry reading, guests are invited to tour Missouri Botanical Garden’s Peter H. Raven Library & Archives at the Bayer Center research institute.

RSVP is encouraged but not required.

ABOUT THE BOOKS

Birdwatching in the 4th Dimension

With percussive alacrity Birdwatching in the 4th Dimension attunes us to the precarity and blinding wonder of life in ages past and present. Joy and mourning mingle in these startling poems, mapped onto the fossil record and the humdrum calamities of the Anthropocene. In Emanuel’s poems, the beat of a heard it enough to conjure crustaceans and crocuses, megatheriea and mantises; it is enough to make them dance in the cosmic matrix of evolution, death, and rebirth.

Nest of Matches

Nest of Matches is a lavish declaration of the beauty of the natural world, queer identity, and of the imagination set free. Whittemore’s third collection explores the complexities of love—romantic, familial, and love for place—and wonders at cycles of life, finding that: “Every habit / even love—strangest / of them all—offers exhaustion / and renewal.” Moving seamlessly from meditations on the moon’s phases to explorations of dream spaces to searches for meaning through patterns of love and loss, Whittemore’s work embodies the mysteries of dichotomies—grief and joy, consciousness and unconsciousness, habit and spontaneity—and how they coexist to create our identities. Throughout the collection, Whittemore reveals how interior nature manifests into exterior habits and how physical landscapes shape the psyche.

ABOUT STAR-ST. LOUIS AVIAN RESCUE

STAR’s mission is to improve and enrich the lives of parrots through rescue, rehabilitative fostering, adoption and education. STAR is a foster-based organization. Birds who enter their adoption program are placed in foster homes, with the eventual goal of placement in forever homes.

To learn more, visit: https://staravian.org/

ABOUT THE POETS

KRISTIN EMANUEL holds an MFA in poetry from the University of Kansas where she studied eco-fabulism and the comics poetry movement. Her latest poems, comics, and essays have appeared in The Rumpus, Ecotone, and Blackbird, with new work forthcoming in Poetry Northwest and Sugar House Review. You can find a list of her selected publications at: https://kristinemanuel.com/.

AMIE WHITTEMORE (she/her) is the author of four poetry collections, most recently Nest of Matches (Autumn House Press). She was the 2020-2021 Poet Laureate of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and an Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow. Her poems have won multiple awards, including a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Prize, and her writing has appeared in Blackbird, Colorado Review, Terrain.org, Pleiades, and elsewhere.

ABOUT THE PETER H. RAVEN LIBRARY

Missouri Botanical Garden’s Peter H. Raven Library & Archives is globally recognized as one of the most comprehensive libraries of botanical literature in the world.

The Library is vital to the Garden’s mission “to discover and share knowledge about plants and their environment, in order to preserve and enrich life.” It serves as an invaluable and irreplaceable resource that supports the work of Garden scientists, students, and researchers from around the globe seeking to better understand, identify, classify, and conserve plants.

For more information, visit the library’s website.

PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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EVENT ORGANIZERS
