The Mad Poets Blog

September starts this week. The bad news is that summer is ending. School is starting back up. Vacation time is over. The good news is that all those reading series that went on hiatus over the summer are coming back soon. Yay!

How about you: What do you have coming up this week, this month, this fall? Let’s hear your good news. Post a comment with the details of any upcoming readings, publications, or other items that might be of interest to other mad poets roaming around the internet.

As for us…

*Week of Aug 31*

• Tues., Sept. 1, 7 p.m.: Open Mic Poetry at Steel City Coffeehouse in Phoenixville, hosted by Mary Kathryn Morgeneier
• Wed., Sept. 2, 7 p.m.: MPS Critique Circle at the Media-Upper Providence Free Library, facilitated by Amy Laub

We’ll see you soon!

Okay, so it’s Tuesday…

The Mad Poets (or at least our trusty web czar) were weakened by a sinus infection.  But we’ve (and by that I mean “I’ve”) propped ourselves up on DayQuil and persevered because there’s still a whole lotta week left and a whole lotta events to shamelessly promote.

So, if you’ve got something you want everyone to know about it, here’s your chance. Post a comment below with all the particulars — who, what, when, where, why, and how — and we’ll do our best to get the word out.

As for the Mad Poets line up this week…

*Week of Aug 17 2009*

• We got nuthin’!

What can I say… it’s the end of the summer, everybody over here’s trying to squeeze in their last bits of sun ‘n fun. But we know you’ve got something going on, so let’s have it!

P.S. For those who are new to the blogosphere or boggled by this commenting thing, check out Posting a Comment, 101. This will give you the full run down on how to post a comment on this (and probably almost any other) blog.

I’ve been told this whole entering comments business can be a little confusing for those who aren’t so familiar with blogs, so hopefully this little primer will help you out if this your first time commenting. As with anything new, it hurts just a little the first time, but after that it can be fun to the point of addictive. We here at the Mad Poets encourage you to practice safe commenting. Do it often, for sure. But always do it with forethought & caution.

Here’s how it works:

Below this post, where it says “Post a Comment,” enter your name as you’d like it to appear (can be your full name, first name, nickname, alias, pet’s name, whatever…), enter a valid email address (we will NOT publish this), enter your website if you’ve got one that you’d like people to visit (if you don’t have your very own site, you can enter your MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or whatever other social networking page you might have), and then enter your comment.

Be sure to give us all the essential information. If it’s a reading, tell us the date, time, venue, type of performance, and anything else we need to know (is there any open mic following your featured reading?).  If you’ve got something published, tell us where we can buy it. Add the url to the website of the publisher or link to the book’s page on Amazon. You pretty much want to hold our hand to the check out. If we can read your poem/story/article online, give us the link & tell us the name of the piece and the publication.  We don’t just want these details. We *crave* them!  (P.S. You can use HTML in the comments, or not. It’s up to you. Don’t sweat it if you don’t know HTML, it’s really no biggie one way or the other.)

If you want to receive emails with all the other comments, click that box. This means you don’t have to keep checking back to the site to see what other comments have been added. On Shameless Monday, its a great way to keep up with what else is going on. It’s also an easy way to immediately know if someone has responded to something you commented, which is always nice to see.  But if you don’t want to get the emails, that’s cool too. Just be sure to check back regularly to see if anyone’s responded to you.

Finally, when you’re done, click “Submit comment.”  If this is your first time, your comment will not appear on the site immediately. It will be emailed to the web czar for approval (this keeps us from getting inundated with spam). Approval usually happens within a few hours. After you’ve had one comment approved, all future comments post to the site immediately since we know you’re a real, live person and not a spam-bot.

Once your comment is approved and posted, your name will appear at the top of the comment. If you’ve entered a website, your name will link to the website.  The comments will show up in a list below the post, in the order they are entered. To see what it looks like, check out last week’s Shameless Monday.

Good luck & happy commenting.

Tamara Oakman, of Philadelphia, has recently completed “Snatch” her MAE thesis project at Arcadia University. She’s been published in Mad Poets Review, Philadelphia Stories, Best of Philladelphia Stories, Many Mountains Moving, and other journals. She runs a series at the Parkway Central Library called The Light of Unity Artist’s and Writer’s Series 2009.

Earlier this year, Tamara initiated a new poetry workshop series for the Mad Poets Society. The Business of Words workshop meets at the University of Pennsylvania Bookstore on the 2nd Saturday of every month, from 1 p.m. – 3 p.m. (The next meeting is Sept 13th.)  You can check her out sooner by heading over to Milkboy Acoustic Cafe this Thursday at 7 p.m. for the Mad Poets Hosts Reading.

Mary Kathryn Morgeneier and all of her various personalities (Kat, Kate, Katie, Mary K, etc.) live in harmony in Phoenixville, PA, where she hosts the Mad Poets Steel City Coffeehouse open mic.

Katie was a born poet, who began telling stories as early as six years old — in her first confession. “As the line to the confessional grew shorter and shorter, I remember working my thumbs into a nervous tizzy,” she explains. “Finally my turn. Bless me Father for I have sinned; it has been no time since my last confession. And then I proceeded to lay a series of colorful but untrue crimes on him. I got ten Hail Marys for my sins, and an extra twenty Hail Marys for lying in my first confession.”

From there, the poetry flowed! Katie says she’s been writing for most of her life but has only been sharing her poetry publicly since joining Mad Poets three years ago.  Like her favorite poet, Emily Dickinson, Katie’s poems are often observations of daily life; she also writes about social issues and personal relationships.

Katie took the reigns of the Steel City Coffeehouse open mic just this year. Her reading is a combination of poetry and music. “The evening turns into a great celebration of the human spirit,” she explains. “Once in awhile it seems that all of the music, poetry, and spoken word resonates with everyone–as if we had all arrived there by divine appointment. It can seem very magical. It’s never dull!”

The Steel City readings happen on the 1st Tuesday of every month; the next one is Sept 1st at 7pm. But, you can catch Katie reading with a slew of other host poets this Thursday at the Milkboy Acoustic Cafe in Bryn Mawr.

Glenn McLaughlin, of Pottstown, PA, is a substitute teacher, recovering bio-tech start up executive, and host of Otherwise – Poetry at Churchill’s. He will join several other poets this week at Milkboy Acoustic Cafe in Bryn Mawr for a table turning evening when the hosts become poets.

University studies in chemistry, years of running and cycling combined with decades of sales in the plastics industry finally led to something worthwhile when his poems began arriving about 10 years ago.  Actually, Glenn can remember almost exactly when his first poem came: “Late April 1997, I think the second half of the month, driving home from Boston, at night, right about when I got on the Jersey Turnpike after crossing the GW Bridge.”

Glenn McLaughlin (the pretty "lady" in the sparkly dress) with G. Emil Reutter at the MPS Book Party

Glenn joined the Mad Poets Society about 5 or so years ago, and since then has spiced up the annual Mad Poets Journal Book Party by dressing in drag. (Yup, that’s him in the dress!)  About three years ago he decided to start a reading series in Pottstown, Otherwise – Poetry at Churchill’s.  ”First, I got tired of having to drive forever to get to a reading if I wanted to hear some good poems,” Glenn explains. “Second, Tanna, the owner of Churchill, wanted to add something to town, something artistic. We started talking one day and the rest is, as they say, history.”

Going back through the archives, it looks like we’ve done this a few times.  Not as many as I would have expected at this point, but 20 Mondays has pretty much exhausted my ability to come up with clever post titles, Monday song references, and the like.  So, we’re just gonna number ‘em from now on.  Let’s see how high we can go.

You should know the drill by now. Drop us a comment letting us know what you’re doing:  reading? peforming? publishing? We want to know the who? what? when? where? why? and how? of it.  ‘Kay?

As for us:

*Week of Aug 10, 2009*

• Thurs Aug 13th, 7pm: Mad Poets’ Series M.C./Host Reading at Milkboy Acoustic Cafe in Bryn Mawr (if you’ve looked at this blog at all in the past few weeks, you’ve heard a thing or two about this special reading!)

Richard Moyer, of Berwyn, currently hosts the open mic poetry series at the Gryphon Cafe in Wayne. Richard has been published in more than 25 small books including The Main Street Rag, The Schuylkill Valley Journal, Willard and Maple, The Endicott Review, Free Verse, The Pink Cadillac, Small Pond Magazine of Literature, The Mad Poet’s Review and others. He has an AB in English from Harvard, an MH (Master of Humanities) from The University of Richmond, and an MA in English from Temple.

Richard is a rare blend of poet and business enthusiast.  “I have been writing poetry off and on all my life — or at least since my sophomore year at Harvard in 1950,” he explains.  His favorite poet is William Carlos Williams, and his favorite poem “The Red Wheelbarrow.” “I sure wish I’d written this poem,” he says.  (Don’t we all!)  He adds that his favorite hobby is following the stock market. “I love to turn on the TV late at night and listen to Bloomberg and what is happening in the Asian Stockmarkets.”

Richard has been a member of the Mad Poets Society for 10 years, having been introduced the group by a friend and former MPS member. He’s been opening the open series at the Gryphon for about five years.  Each month, about five to seven poets gather in the upstairs room at the Gryphon.

“I start off the meeting with a reading from an established poet and then everyone in a circle reads their poems for another two hours,” Richard explains.  This series is special because it allows poets the opportunity to really practice reading and hearing their own poems.

The group meets about four times per year. The next open mic reading at the Grypon is scheduled for September 21 at 7pm.

Amy E. Laub, of Upper Darby, claims that her poems pretty much write themselves – she just takes notes as fast as she can.  A long-time member of the Mad Poets Society, Amy hosts the MPS Critique Circle on first Wednesdays in Media, Pa.  She also works tirelessly as an assistant editor for the Mad Poets Review. When she’s not busting her hump (for free) for the Mad Poets, Amy gets paid to be a full-time secretary for a public school district.

Amy began writing poems in the third grade when her teacher, Mrs. Clothier, assigned Thanksgiving poems. She found the Mad Poets Society in the late 90s thanks to a flyer in the Media Town Mall.  And thankfully for us, she has been leading the Mad Poets Critique Circle since the fall of 2003.

“The Circle started in April 2003,” Amy explains. “[That fall] Eileen D’Angelo asked me if could take over hosting it.  I was — and still am — honored and thrilled to do so.”

Amy says the Critique Circle includes about 30 local poets, about eight to 12 of whom get together on the first Wednesday of the month at the Media-Upper Providence Free Library.  “We read our original poems and discuss how to improve them,” Amy explains. “The group is warm, friendly, humorous, constructive, and diplomatic.  I find it enormously helpful with my writing.  Newcomers are always welcome.”

Amy is inspired by pay raises, naps, and anything chocolate (it’s pretty hard to argue with those!).  She despises pantyhose and will only wear them if she’ll be rewarded with an open bar (fair enough). Her favorite poet is Sharon Black, a local poet who lives in Wallingford, PA.   The one poem she wishes she’d written:

empty bench–

rain
sits down.

~by Joel Weishaus

Amy’s own aesthetic is simple, but not simplistic.  She excels at finding depth in the “mundane.”  As a poet and poetry leader, Amy is fresh and honest.  Her’s is definitely a voice you should stop and listen to, attentively.  So, come out and do that on August 13th why don’t you??

It’s Monday — which means it’s time to do some shameless self-promoting on the Mad Poets blog.  If you’ve ever been to a poetry reading you know all about shameless self-promotion.  So, give it a go:  post a comment letting us know where you’re reading or where we can buy your book or read your articles or hear your spoken word tracks or view pictures of latest vacation… okay, maybe not that last one.  Unless they’re really good pictures & you went some place truly interesting.

New this week, I’m adding a little something extra to Shameless Monday.  I’m going to get a little shameless on behalf of MPS and offer up a little round up of our events for the week.  Here goes:

*Week of Aug 3, 2009*

• Tuesday Aug 4th, 7pm: Open mic poetry at Steel City Coffeehouse in Phoenixville, hosted by Mary Kathryn Morgeneier
• Wednesday Aug 5th, 7pm:  MPS Critique Circle at the Media-Upper Providence Free Library, lead by Amy Laub.

Can’t wait to hear what you’s all are doing this week.  And if you’re not doing anything, well, then I hope to see you at one of our fine events!