#poetry-month

#poetry-month

A vision lay before him: Fleet Street blanketed with snow, silent, empty, pure white, and, at the end of it, the huge and majestic form of Saint Paul's Cathedral. It was a spellbinding moment: the great thoroughfare temporarily devoid of carts and carriages, the cathedral looming blurrily out of the still-falling snowflakes a real-life snow globe.

Sadly, on Nov. 1, 2023, the Nuyorican Poets Cafe closed its location at 236 E 3rd St. to undergo a three-year Nuyoricanstruction project aimed at renovating its 100-year-old building, with plans to reopen in 2026. During that time, the cafe has partnered with the Bowery Poetry Club to host a Nuyorican Poets Cafe Slam every Monday night beginning at 7 p.m.

I didn't know who I was as a writer. I didn't know my voice or style. I was trying to be whatever writer I loved at the moment. You have to find authenticity, find your own voice. Marie's class gave me the ability to be a storyteller.

Tender Hearts Club: Volume One, an anthology gathering love in all its forms—erotic and everyday, revolutionary and quiet, love that refuses to disappear.

For Lowell There are things which, said and true, are of this generation's past; of fighting freedom's battles and of taking off the mask- stories of the actions taken, to blot out the blights of sin, how heroes and the valorous fought their enemies within, Would we be traitors to our bugle, which beckons with its call? - They won freedom for their people but in fine print said: be damned.

It was the first Wednesday of December and the last One-Page Wednesday of 2025. Hosted by Portland novelist Emme Lund (The Boy with a Bird in His Chest) at the Literary Arts bookstore, the free monthly event is an open mic that functions more like a public writers' group. Students, aspiring writers, and National Book Award-winning authors hang out and read aloud one page from a work in progress.

Because, let's face it, creative work does require some form of faith. It is a tumultuous thing to launch an idea into a vast nothingness and hope that it makes a light bright enough to be found by others. Luckily, these luminaries were my light, and I hope they may become yours as well, and - more so - that these snippets lead you to more of their work.