Alienated Majesty Books

Author Event:
Multi-Genre Reading, Q&A, Book Signing

Join us for a lively literary evening, as Austin's Alienated Majesty Books hosts a reading and conversation between writers across multiple genres.

Austin-based poet Hollie Hardy will read from her new poetry collection, Lions Like Us, recently released on Red Light Lit Press. Fiction writer Emily Jon Tobias will read from her recently published debut story collection, MONARCH (Black Lawrence Press). Local author and podcaster Scott Semegran will host and read a teaser from his latest novel, The Codger and the Sparrow (TCU Press).

Book signing and refreshments to follow Q&A.

Featuring:

Hollie Hardy
Emily Jon Tobias

Hosted by: Scott Semegran

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Thursday, August 15, 2024
6pm

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Alienated Majesty Books
613 W. 29th ST
Austin, TX

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Free Event

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AUTHOR BIOS

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of the newly released Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, and hosts the long-running monthly reading series Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals including Bay Area Generations, Cobalt Poets, Colossus, The Common, Dispatches from Quarantine, Eleven Eleven, Fourteen Hills, Migozine, Milvia Street Journal, Mixed Bag of Tricks, Parthenon West Review, Passionfruit Review, sPARKLE & bLINK, Transfer, and elsewhere. She lives in Austin, TX. Learn more at: holliehardy.com

Emily Jon Tobias is an American author and poet. She is an award-winning writer whose work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, along with other honorable mentions, and has been featured in literary journals such as Santa Clara Review, Talking River Review, Flying South Literary Journal, Furrow Literary Journal, The Opiate Magazine, The Ocotillo Review, Jerry Jazz Musician, Typehouse Literary Magazine, Tahoma Literary Review, Big Muddy, Spoon Knife, Peauxdunque Review, and elsewhere. Midwestern-raised, she now lives and writes on the coast of Southern California and holds a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Pacific University Oregon. MONARCH: Stories (Black Lawrence Press, 2024) is her debut collection.

Scott Semegran is an award-winning writer of nine books. BlueInk Review described him best as “a gifted writer, with a wry sense of humor.” His latest novel, The Codger and the Sparrow (Paperback from TCU Press, Audiobook from Vibrance Press), is a comical yet moving story about a 65-year-old widower’s unlikely friendship with a 16-year-old troublemaker. His eight previous books include The Benevolent Lords of Sometimes Island, which was the first-place winner for Middle-Grade/Young Adult fiction in the 2021 Writer’s Digest Book Awards, and To Squeeze a Prairie Dog, which was the winner of the 2020 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award Gold Medal for Humor. He lives in Austin, Texas with his wife. They have four kids, two cats, and a dog. He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in English. Scott Semegran is co-host of the web series Austin Liti Limits along with fellow writer Larry Brill.

Smushed Blueberries

Smushed Blueberries: Stories, Poems & Other Juice is an open mic reading series held at Epoch Coffee's Village location in North Austin on the last Sunday of the month. This welcoming and intimate event is a safe space for writers to share their stories, poems, plays, satires, and diary entries, or simply sit and listen.

Featuring:
Hollie Hardy

Hosted by: Meg Jerit

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Sunday, July 28, 2024
5pm

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Epoch Coffee Village
2700 W Anderson Ln #409
Austin, TX

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Free Event

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Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of the newly released Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, and hosts the long-running monthly reading series Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals including Bay Area Generations, Cobalt Poets, Colossus, The Common, Dispatches from Quarantine, Eleven Eleven, Fourteen Hills, Migozine, Milvia Street Journal, Mixed Bag of Tricks, Parthenon West Review, Passionfruit Review, sPARKLE & bLINK, Transfer, and elsewhere. She lives in Austin, TX.

SNS | 7-27-24

Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Dale Bridges & Theory

Theme: The Movies
(scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday July 27, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 821 7948 2345

Passcode: 568249

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Author Bios

Dale Bridges is a fiction writer, essayist, and painter. His work has appeared in more than thirty publications, including The Rumpus, The Masters Review, and Barrelhouse Magazine. For several years, he was the arts-and-entertainment editor at the Boulder Weekly, where he won journalism awards for his feature writing and cultural criticism. He has published a book of short stories Justice, Inc. (Monkey Puzzle Press) and a novel called The Mean Reds (SFA Press). He currently lives in Austin and works at the library.

Billy Song aka Theory is a poet and writer from New York City. He has a Bachelors in Film Making and an MFA in Fiction from the University of San Francisco, and is publishing his first novel. With Liz Cahill, he is the co-founder and creative director of Decentered Arts, a San Francisco non-profit organization dedicated to building an interconnected community for artists of all mediums. Theory is a resident and volunteer at The Center SF and works as a senior video editor for Vox.

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, July 22, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

July Writing Prompt: The Movies

In the last 100 years, perhaps no other artistic medium has provided more fodder for poetry than the cinema. Movies have become central to the poetic imagination, whether the poet celebrates the movies or reacts against celluloid saturation. ~Poetry Foundation

Your challenge this month is to write a poem (or 3-minute prose piece, scene, monologue, song, etc) inspired by cinema.

SOME IDEAS:

• Write about the movies in general, a specific movie or actor, a movie genre, a memorable movie-going experience, a Netflix-and-chill session on the couch, an old drive-in, Hollywood, Blockbuster Video, the Oscars, etc.

• Or your writing might borrow some famous movie lines.

• Or borrow the techniques of film, giving your poem or story a cinematic eye, describing the world as a camera might see it, focused on image.

• Or go see a movie or watch one at home, but do it like a writer. Take notes, make observations, when it's done (or pause anytime) write a poem, story, scene, or monologue.

As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement; feel free to interpret loosely or ignore. Below are some poems about movies, some funny, some serious, to inspire you.

FOR INSPIRATION

"Ode to Patrick Swayze" by Tishani Doshi

"Sean Penn Anti-Ode" by Dean Young

"Anna May Wong Has Breakfast at Tiffany's" by Sally Wen Mao

"The James Bond Movie" by May Swenson

"Video Blues" by Mary Jo Salter

"Scary Movies" by Kim Addonizio

"Everything's a Fake" by Fanny Howe

"Ave Maria" by Frank O'Hara

"Charlie Chaplin Impersonates a Poet" by Cornelius Eady

"The Last Movie," by Rachel Hadas

NOTE: The SNS writing prompts will soon be integrated into my new subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets

Red Light Lit: Seattle

Join us for an evening of poetry, stories, and live music, exploring themes of love, sex, and relationships in celebration of Hollie Hardy’s newly released poetry collection, Lions Like Us published by Red Light Lit Press.

Featuring:

Hollie Hardy
Amber Flame
Josh Mohr
Nick Jaina

Music:

Mary Simich

Hosted By: Jennifer Lewis

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Saturday, July 20, 2024
7pm

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Base Camp Studios 2
1901 3rd Ave.
Seattle, WA

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$20

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Author Bios

Hollie Hardy is a poet, educator, and award-winning author of Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press, 2024) and How to Take a Bullet, And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press, 2014). She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU and teaches private poetry workshops online. She is the founder of Praxis Poetry and host of the long-running monthly reading series Saturday Night Special, a Virtual Open Mic. Publications include The Common, Fourteen Hills, Colossus, Eleven Eleven, MiGoZine, Poetry Superhighway, sPARKLE & bLink, Parthenon West Review, and other journals. She lives in Austin, TX.

 
Amber Flame is an interdisciplinary artist whose work garnered residencies with Hedgebrook, Vermont Studio Center, and more. Her first poetry collection, Ordinary Cruelty, was published through Write Bloody Press. Flame is a recipient of Seattle Office of Arts and Culture's CityArtist grant and served as Hugo House's 2017-2019 Writer-in-Residence for Poetry. Amber Flame is a queer Black dandy in Tacoma, Washington, who falls hard for a jumpsuit and some fresh kicks.

 
Joshua Mohr is the author of the memoirs Model Citizen (2021) and Sirens, as well as five novels including Damascus, which The New York Times called “Beat-poet cool." He's also written Fight Song and Some Things that Meant the World to Me, one of O Magazine's Top 10 reads of 2009 and a San Francisco Chronicle best-seller, as well as Termite Parade, an Editors' Choice in The New York Times. His novel All This Life won the Northern California Book Award. He is the founder of Decant Editorial.

 
Jennifer Lewis is a writer, editor, and publisher of Red Light Lit. Her debut short story collection, The New Low (Black Lawrence Press), was an SPD Bestseller. She is the winner of the Nomadic Press Bindle Award and The Los Angeles Review Flash Fiction Award. Her fiction has appeared in publications such as Cosmonauts Avenue, Midnight Breakfast, The Los Angeles Press, and CRAFT, among others. Additionally, her most recent nonfiction work has been featured in The Rumpus, Alta Journal, and Joshua Tree Voice. She received her MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State University. Jennifer teaches at The Writing Salon in San Francisco.
 

Nick Jaina is an author and musician living in Oakland, California. His 2015 memoir Get It While You Can was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. His work has appeared in McSweeney's, Atlantic Monthly, Wilderness House Review, Somnambulist, Oregon Journal of the Humanities, and many other places. His newest book SPEKTRUM is out now. He has composed music scores for feature films, such as the indie comedy All Sorts and the forest fire documentary Elemental. He also co-founded a ballet collective in New York City, in which he was the musical composer and worked with dancers from Juilliard and New York City Ballet and performed works at the Baryshnikov Center and BAM Center for the Arts. Thus far, Nick has recorded (at least) 16 studio albums.

 
Mary Simich effortlessly infuses a timeless soul into her music. Renowned for her haunting ballads and dusty voice reminiscent of mid-century artists, Mary captivates audiences with her original compositions on the acoustic guitar. Her album, How Does Time Begin, released under Khanabilism/Ernest Jenning Records, is available across all major streaming platforms.

Red Light Lit: Portland

Bring a chair!!
Join us for an evening of al fresco poetry and live music, exploring themes of love and relationships in celebration of Hollie Hardy’s newly released poetry collection, Lions Like Us published by Red Light Lit Press.

Featuring:

Hollie Hardy
Jessie Carver
Justin Rigamonti
Jennifer Lewis
Charity Yoro
Armin Tolentino

Live Music:

Nick Jaina
Mary Simich

Hosted By: Jennifer Lewis

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Friday, July 19, 2024
7pm

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Grover’s Curiosity Shop
1410 SE Clinton St.
Portland, OR

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Free Event

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Author Bios

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from San Francisco State University and teaches private writing workshops online. She is the founder of Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets, and host of Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals. She lives in Austin, TX. Learn more at: holliehardy.com

Charity E. Yoro (she/her) is a steward of words and other beings. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, The Rumpus, poets.org, Tupelo Quarterly, and elsewhere, and has been supported by Regional Arts & Culture Council and Sustainable Arts Foundation. Born, raised, and educated on the east side of O‘ahu, she currently lives west of the Willamette with her wild, loving family.

Jessie Carver is a queer writer and editor who lives in Portland, Oregon, but grew up on a farm in the borderlands of New Mexico. Jessie’s short stories and poems have appeared in various literary journals and the anthology Love Is the Drug & Other Dark Poems, and she co-authored the nonfiction book Rethinking Paper & Ink: The Sustainable Publishing Revolution. She won the 2024 Phyllis Grant Zellmer Prize for Fiction. You can find her online at jessiecarver.com.

Justin Rigamonti teaches English at Portland Community College and serves as the Program Coordinator for the Carolyn Moore Writing Residency. His poems have been recently published or are forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Radar, New Ohio Review, Thrush, and Smartish Pace, and his poem “The Secret” is forthcoming in the anthology Poetry of Grief, Gratitude, and Reverence from Wisdom Publications.

Armin Tolentino is the author of the collection We Meant to Bring It Home Alive (Alternating Current Press) and served as poet laureate for Clark County, WA from 2021-2023. He is a phenomenal clapper, a passable ukulele player, and a bumbling, but enthusiastic, fisherman. More info at www.armintolentino.com.

Jennifer Lewis is a writer, editor, and publisher of Red Light Lit. Her debut short story collection, The New Low (Black Lawrence Press), was an SPD Bestseller. She is the winner of the Nomadic Press Bindle Award and The Los Angeles Review Flash Fiction Award. She received her MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State University and her writing is widely published in magazines and journals. Jennifer teaches at The Writing Salon in San Francisco and is a staff writer for Alta Journal.

Nick Jaina is an author and musician living in Oakland, California. His latest book SPEKTRUM was released in 2022 by Modern Mythographer press. His 2015 memoir Get It While You Can was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. His work has appeared in McSweeney's, Atlantic Monthly, Somnambulist, and many other places. He has composed music scores for feature films and a documentary and he co-founded a ballet collective in New York City.

Mary Simich is a singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, with a dusty voice reminiscent of a reincarnated mid-century artist. Listen on Bandcamp

SNS | 6-29-24

Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Susana Praver-Pérez & Isra Cheema

Theme: Throwback
(scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday June 29, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 861 9795 9446

Passcode: 609721

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Author Bios

Isra Cheema (she/they) is a queer, Pakistani, spiritual Muslim witch, and poet from the heart of Oklahoma. She holds an MFA from Texas State University and is the Poetry Editor of Porter House Review. She has work forthcoming or published in Ghost City Press, Thin Air Magazine, Gigantic Sequins, and elsewhere. She lives somewhere in between Austin and San Marcos with her two cats, AJ and Rosy. IG: @tiramisruu

Susana Praver-Pérez is a Pushcart-nominated, bilingual poet and visual artist. A former Physician Assistant and Associate Medical Director at La Clinica de la Raza in Oakland, California, Susana left medicine in 2021 after four decades of community service, to pursue her passion for poetry and art on a full-time basis. Susana studied Creative Writing at Berkeley City College, Naropa Institute, U.C. Berkeley’s “Poetry for the People,” and at countless community-based classes. She is an alumna of both Macondo and Las Dos Brujas Writers’ Workshops. Her first full-length book of poetry Hurricanes, Love Affairs, and Other Disasters received the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature (2022). Her second full-length collection Return Against the Flow, published by Black Lawrence Press in 2024, was chosen by both Ms. Magazine and NYU’s Latinx Project as their top 30+ poetry picks for the year. Susana divides her time between Oakland, California and San Juan, Puerto Rico and writes through the lens formed in the liminal space between languages, cultures, and geographies.
website: susanapraverperez.com FB: @susana.praverperez IG: @la.doctora.susana

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, June 22, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

June Writing Prompt: Throwback

This month’s theme is inspired by the social media trend Throwback Thursday (#tbt) in which people post old photos and share memories for nostalgia or humor, and reflect on the past.

Throwback refers to an atavistic return to previous times—an older way of doing something, the fashion or art or technology of an earlier era, a regression or look backward

Write a poem (or short prose piece) inspired by this month’s theme.

SOME IDEAS:

• Get out the box of old photos, or scroll through your social media feed, or go through pics on your phone (the AI generated “for you” and “remember when” albums are always full of surprises) Let one or more of these photos trigger a memory or story to pull you onto the page. Or start a poem composed of photo captions.

• A poem in snapshots; fragments of memories

• Describe a throw back version of you—when you had different hair and clothes, hobbies, goals, beliefs,  attitudes, friends 

• Write about an earlier time in your life (or in the life of your kids, parents, grandparents) or another era in history

• Reflect on the retro details of you childhood, your 20s, 30s, the 1970s, the family vacation, the Roman Empire 

• Respond to a throwback meme—I get them all the time for 80s stuff, often they are checklists of things that “you are old if you remember”—rotary phones, corduroy pants, old Atari games, VCRs, Cabbage Patch Dolls, Red Rover, crimped hair, passing notes, roller skating, side ponytails, latch key kids, JC penny’s catalogs, boom boxes (the music of your youth). What are the hallmarks of your youth or another time period that feels totally different from now? Let some of those details into your writing.

• Write about your old neighborhood before you moved or it changed (or you did) 

As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement; feel free to interpret loosely or ignore. The following sample poems offer a variety of different topics and techniques to inspire you. Enjoy!

FOR INSPIRATION

Throwback Night, Midway Skating Rink by Brittany Rogers

Equestrian Monuments (A Litany) by Luis Chaves (translated by Julia Guez and Samantha Zighelboim

Back Then by Trish Crapo

Hip Hop Analogies by Tara Betts

The Throwback by Paul Muldoon

Olympic Drive by Kyle Dargan

Acknowledgments by Danez Smith

The Bad Old Days by Kenneth Rexroth

Balance by Dorianne Laux

Bad Hair Day by Jeffrey McDaniel (short prose)

Charles Bukowski, Family Guy (memoir, essay)

NOTE: The SNS writing prompts will soon be integrated into my new subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets

Red Light Lit Austin: Dark Waters

Plunge into a world of love and intrigue, where shadows conceal the heart’s secrets and only the brave survive the depths!

FEATURING:

Poetry
Hollie Hardy
Diego de Stefano
Shannon Percell
Lala Daniel

Burlesque
Coneja

Comedy
Angelina Martin

Music
Brandix

Live Drawing
Holly Cerna

Hosted By: Loria Mendoza

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Friday, June 28, 2024
10pm

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Dark Horse
1209 E. Cesar Chavez St.
Austin, TX

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$15 Suggested Donation
No one turned away

Red Light Lit: Wonder Valley

Join us in the desert for a red hot evening of poetry, stories, and live music, exploring themes of love, sex, and relationships in celebration of Hollie Hardy’s newly released poetry collection, Lions Like Us published by Red Light Lit Press.

Featuring:

Kevin Bone
Hollie Hardy
Shawanda Gatson
Natasha Dennerstein
Joanna Szachowska
Susan Rukeyser
Anna Tyson
Dan Thomas
DW

Live Music:

Landroid
Matt Stevenson

Hosted By: Jennifer Lewis

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Saturday, June 15, 2024
7pm

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The Palms in Wonder Valley
83131 Amboy Rd
Twentynine Palms, CA

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$10 at the Door

Red Light Lit: LA

Beyond Baroque presents: Red Light Lit with Hollie Hardy

Join us for an evening of poetry exploring themes of love, sex, and relationships in celebration of Hollie Hardy’s newly released poetry collection, Lions Like Us published by Red Light Lit Press.

Featuring:

Jeffrey Bryant
Dennis Cruz
Natasia Dennerstein
Rich Ferguson
Hollie Hardy
Traci Kato-Kiriyama
Rick Lupert
K.R. Morrison
Linda Ravenswood
Dig Wayne

Hosted By: Jennifer Lewis

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Friday, June 14, 2024
8pm

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Beyond Baroque
681 N. Venice Blvd.
Venice, CA

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Free Event

Book tour donations welcome!!

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Author Bios

Jeffrey Bryant is a Pushcart-nominated queer poet/writer who lives in Los Angeles.  His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Weekly, the Los Angeles Times, Poetic Diversity, the New Verse News, Poetrysuperhighway.com, Synchroniciti Magazine and Quill and Echo. His work has also appeared in the anthologies The Coiled Serpent from Tia Chucha Press; the 2020 Altadena Literary Review from Shabda Press; Shadowplay Literary Journal from the University of Arkansas and Sparring with Beatnik Ghosts from Mystic Boxing Commission Press.

Dennis Cruz is a vital poet who inhabits the voice of the perpetual outsider and the purely American dissident. He has been writing, performing and publishing his work for over 30 years. His latest collection of Poetry THE BEAST IS WE is out now via Punk Hostage Press.

Natasha Dennerstein was born in Melbourne, Australia. She has an MFA from San Francisco State University. Natasha has had poetry published in many journals internationally, including The North American Review and Spoon River Poetry Review. Her collections Anatomize (2015), Triptych Caliform (2016) and her novella-in-verse About a Girl (2017) were published by Norfolk Press in San Francisco. Her trans chapbook Seahorse (2017) was published by Nomadic Press in Oakland and is now available through Black Lawrence Press. Broken: A Life of Aileen Wuornos in 33 poems was published in 2021 by Be About It Press. She lives in Alameda, California, where she is a freelance editor. She was a 2018 Fellow of the Lambda Literary Writer’s Retreat and writer-in-residence there in fiction in 2023. Forthcoming in 2024 is Apps Poetica from The LA Press

L.A. poet/spoken-word performer Rich Ferguson has shared the stage with Patti Smith, Wanda Coleman, Moby, and other esteemed poets and musicians.  He is a featured performer in the film, What About Me? featuring Michael Stipe, Michael Franti, k.d. lang, and others. His poetry and award-winning spoken-word music videos have appeared in numerous anthologies and festivals. He is the author of the novel New Jersey Me (Rare Bird Books), and two poetry collections 8th & Agony (Punk Hostage Press), and Everything is Radiant Between the Hates (Moon Tide Press). Most recently, Ferguson is the lead editor of an anthology of CA poets entitled Beat Not Beat (Moon Tide Press).

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of the newly released Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, and hosts the long-running monthly reading series Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals including Bay Area Generations, Cobalt Poets, Colossus, The Common, Dispatches from Quarantine, Eleven Eleven, Fourteen Hills, Migozine, Milvia Street Journal, Mixed Bag of Tricks, Parthenon West Review, Passionfruit Review, sPARKLE & bLINK, Transfer, and elsewhere. She lives in Austin, TX. Learn more at: holliehardy.com

traci kato-kiriyama (they+she) is an award-winning multi-, inter-, and transdisciplinary artist, recognized for their work as a writer, performer, theatre deviser, cultural producer, and community organizer. Their recognition & support includes the Art Matters Foundation; the CA State Senate Breaking Silence Award; ONE Archives Pride Publics; and the NEFA National Theatre Project for TALES OF CLAMOR and PULLproject Ensemble. tkk’s writing, commentary and work appears in numerous media and print publications (including NPR; PBS; Elle.com; Entropy; Chaparral Canyon Press; Tia Chucha Press; Bamboo Ridge Press; Heyday Books; Temple UP).

Rick Lupert is the recipient of the 2017 Ted Slade Award, the 2014 recipient of the Beyond Baroque Distinguished service award for service to poetry in Southern California, and a 3-time Pushcart and one time Best of the Net nominee. He created Poetry Super Highway the daily haiku site Haikuniverse and hosted the weekly Cobalt Cafe reading for almost 21 years. (Which lives on as a Zoom series.) He’s authored 28 collections of poetry (most recently It’s Spritz O’Clock Somewhere). He writes a weekly Jewish poetry column for JewishJournal.com and created the daily web comic Cat and Banana with Brendan Constantine.

K.R. Morrison is a Bay Area poet, drummer, and teen educator who since the pandemic, splits her time between San Francisco and a place she calls Mermaid Town, in Southern California. Morrison is a two-time Pushcart nominee and has featured for several curations and podcasts for her first collection of poetry, Cauldrons, published by PaperPress Books. Morrison seeks to cocreate with other artists and educators to construct fresh new communities that liberate families and their youth from old toxic forms of patriarchy. These days she engages this through writing workshops, teen life coaching, and divine feminine cultivation within the juvenile hall injustice system, in Southern California. Morrison’s poetry can be found in several publications, and in 9 anthologies in 2023. She plans to release a new collection soon titled, “From her Wrist.”"

 Linda Ravenswood BFA MA, PhD, is a poet and performance artist from Los Angeles. Her accolades include an Oxford Prize in Poetry (2022) and the Edwin Markham Prize in Poetry (2023). She is the founding editor of The Los Angeles Press, est. 2018, and the co-founder of the Poet Laureate program in Glendale, California. Her recent collections include Cantadora—letters from California (Eyewear London/The Black Spring Press Group, 2023), The Stan Poems (Pedestrian Press, 2022), Tlacuilx—Tongues in Quarantine (HINCHAS Press, 2021), and XLA Poets (HINCHAS Press, 2020). Find her at thelosangelespress.com

Los Angeles poet Dig Wayne teaches Method Acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in West Hollywood. Originally from Ohio, Dig has lived, worked, and practiced his art in New York City and London. He has published two books of poetry, Hip Pockets and Bongo Skin. His recent collection, One Fell Swoop was published by innateDIVINITYbooks. His poetry has been featured in the literary journals, High Shelf Press XXIX, Juke Joint, Ligeia Magazine, Askew Poetry, Spillway Poetry, Abramlin Press and more recently, the Anthology of Sparring with Beatnik Ghosts.

Book Soup

Red Light Lit and Book Soup present

New works — an evening reading, Q&A, and book signing

Featuring:

Hollie Hardy (Lions Like Us)

Emily Jon Tobias (MONARCH: Stories)

Arthur Kayzakian (The Book of Redacted Paintings)

Jennifer Lewis (The New Low)

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Thursday, June 13, 2024
7pm

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Book Soup
8818 Sunset Blvd
West Hollywood, CA

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Free Event

Red Light Lit: SF

Red Light Lit presents: Lions Like Us

Join us for an evening of poetry, storytelling, and live music exploring themes of love, sex, and relationships in celebration of Hollie Hardy’s newly released poetry collection, published by Red Light Lit Press.

Featuring:

Peter Bullen
Liz Cahill
Miah Jeffra
Loria Mendoza
Christine No
Kelechi Ubozoh
Matthew Zapruder
Hollie Hardy

Live Music:

Sass N Harmony

Hosted By: Jennifer Lewis

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Sunday, June 9, 2024
7pm

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Make-Out Room
3225 22nd ST.
San Francisco, CA

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Tickets $15 at the door

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Author Bios

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of the newly released Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, and hosts the long-running monthly reading series Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals including Bay Area Generations, Cobalt Poets, Colossus, The Common, Dispatches from Quarantine, Eleven Eleven, Fourteen Hills, Migozine, Milvia Street Journal, Mixed Bag of Tricks, Parthenon West Review, Passionfruit Review, sPARKLE & bLINK, Transfer, and elsewhere. She lives in Austin, TX. Learn more at: holliehardy.com

Matthew Zapruder is the author of six collections of poetry, most recently I Love Hearing Your Dreams, forthcoming from Scribner in September 2024, as well as two books of prose: Why Poetry (Ecco, 2017) and Story of a Poem (Unnamed, 2023). He is editor at large at Wave Books, where he edits contemporary poetry, prose, and translations. From 2016-7 he held the annually rotating position of Editor of the Poetry Column for the New York Times Magazine, and was the Editor of Best American Poetry 2022. He teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing at Saint Mary’s College of California.

Peter Thomas Bullen cuts hair by day and writes by night. He could use more sleep. His book Wallflower was described by Joshua Mohr this way: \This strange bullet of a book reads like a lovely mash-up of John Barth and Gary Lutz. Bullen has a keen eye for bringing the pathos of our age to light./ His many live readings for the Quiet Lightning series can be found on YouTube. His work has appeared in Los Angeles Review of Books and sPARKLE & bLINK, among other places. 

Liz Cahill is a poet, producer and curator based in the Mission. Her writing explores the impacts of late stage capitalism, income inequality and waste, while trying to find beauty in the garbage age. She’s the co-founder of Decentered Arts, a non-profit building resilient community through art of all mediums. She’s the co-host of Decentered at The Center weekly open mic and co-founder of the Poolside Poets reading series. Her writing can be found on her instagram @liz.cahll  

Miah Jeffra is author of four books—most recently The Violence Almanac (finalist for several awards, including the Grace Paley and Robert C Jones Book Prizes) and the novel American Gospel, finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award—and is co-editor of the anthology Home is Where You Queer Your Heart. Work can be seen in StoryQuarterly, Prairie Schooner, The North American Review, Barrelhouse, DIAGRAM, storySouth and many others. Miah is co-founder of Whiting Award-winning queer and trans literary collaborative, Foglifter Press, and teaches writing and decolonial studies at Sonoma State University.

 Loria Mendoza is a queer Chicanx writer, curator, and performance artist from Austin, Texas. Their book, Life’s Too Short (Fourteen Hills Press) won the Michael Rubin Book Award and their debut book of poetry, The Body Can Tolerate is forthcoming in 2025. They are the curator and host of Red Light Lit Austin, Director of Events for the South Austin Art Project, COO of the Austin Arts Foundation, and a big time believer in the healing power of art, community, storytelling, and love. Follow them @textualseduction.  

Christine No is a Korean American poet, filmmaker, and daughter of immigrants. She is a Sundance Alum, VONA Fellow, two-time Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net Nominee. She has served as Assistant Features Editor for the Rumpus, as Fellow, then as a Program Coordinator for VONA. Currently, Christine is board member with Quiet Lightning, a Bay Area literary nonprofit and works as the Advocacy Program Manager at ARTogether, an organization committed to using art and storytelling to build and empower newcomer immigrant and refugee communities; and to promote healing, cultural humility, and intercommunity connection.

Kelechi Ubozoh is a Nigerian-American writer and mental health advocate. Originally from Brooklyn, New York, she was the first undergraduate published in The New York Times. Her book with LD Green, We’ve Been Too Patient, elevates marginalized voices of lived experience who have endured psychiatric mistreatment. Her work is featured in Argot Magazine, Multiplicity, Essential Truths, sParkle & bLINK, Trauma, Tresses, & Truth, and When We Exhale. She co-hosts the Bay Area reading series MoonDrop Productions with Cassandra Dallett and has received a Pushcart Prize nomination. Learn more at kelechiubozoh.com.

Oakland Book Launch Party

This is it! The lions are here at last!

Come help me celebrate the release of my second full-length poetry collection Lions Like Us, (Red Light Lit Press) back in my Bay Area stopping grounds, with students, friends, family, and local writers. Everyone is invited!

I wanted this reading, the first stop on my summer book tour, to feel like a curated in-person Saturday Night Special reunion reading, with many of my favorite writers reading for just 3 minutes each. I’ll also have a small open mic, time permitting.

Featuring:

Melissa Anderson
Tracy Artson
Sara Biel
Paul Corman-Roberts
Cassandra Dallett
Justin Demeter
Natasha Dennerstein
Hollie Hardy
Yume Kim
Alexandra Kostoulas
Karen Marker
Garrett Murphy
Riley O'Connell
Indiana Pehlivanova
Drew Sage
Elisa Salasin
SB Stokes
Valerie Sopher
Kimi Sugioka
Maw Shein Win
Vagabond Empire

Music:
The Corrupt Money Changer

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Friday, June 7, 2024
7pm

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Studio Morey
5500 Martin Luther King Jr. Way
Oakland, CA

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Free Event

Book tour donations welcome!!

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Author Bios

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of the newly released Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press). She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, runs Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets, and hosts the monthly online reading series Saturday Night Special. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals. She lives in Austin, TX.
Learn more at: holliehardy.com

Melissa Anderson, a poet, piemaker, neurobiologist, and psychotherapist has been published in Critica, Croneswords, Pacific Coast, as well as Life Sciences, Brain Research Bulletin and the European Journal of Pharmacology. Writing is Life! 

Tracy Artson is a poet and licensed psychologist in California. Poems published in The Passionfruit Review, Colossus Press, The Los Angeles Press, River Heron Review (Fall, 2023). Pushcart nominated by River Heron Review. www.tracyartsonpsychologist.com

Sara Biel is a social worker, corvid negotiator, and poet in Oakland, CA. She is an editor at Colossus Press and a curator with the Starting Points series. Her chapbook, Prescribed Burn was published in 2023.

Paul Corman-Roberts is the author of the Firecracker nominated poetry collection "Bone Moon Palace" (Black Lawrence Press) and the self published Graphic Chapbook "The Sincere" (Libran Apocalypse.)  He is also a recovering sports addict and drummer. 

Cassandra Dallett is looking for the next chapter. She is the author of multiple chapbooks and full-length books of poetry, most recently A Pretty Little Wilderness (Be About It Press). On Sunday, A Finch and Collapse (Nomadic Press), were both nominated for CA Book awards.

Justin Demeter is a queer poet and painter who lives in Oakland. He’s been published in Trans Bodies Trans Selves and in anthologies from New Words Press and Beyond the Veil Press. Find his art at justindemeterart.com

 Born in Melbourne, Natasha Dennerstein holds an MFA from San Francisco State. She has had several books of poetry published and her work has appeared in many journals in the USA, UK, Australia and New Zealand. Forthcoming this summer is Apps Poetica from The Los Angeles Press.

Yume Kim is a poet, essayist, educator, and author of Reserve the Right. She is now working on a new manuscript, which includes poems calling out the racist hypocrisy that still exists in academia.

Alexandra Kostoulas is the founder and executive director of SF Creative Writing Institute. She writes poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. She believes her best work is yet to come.

Karen Marker is an Oakland based writer who is grateful she has teachers like Hollie who inspire her to build a life around writing and reading poetry and get some of her work published.

 Garrett Murphy is an Oakland-based poet and author who has often been considered a "political and human nature satirist."  His most recent publication is MURPHY'S LOG, a compilation of newer and previously published works.

In the first grade, a teacher told Riley O’Connell to “get her nose out of a book and get a life”—advice which she did not heed. Since then, Riley has gone on to have poems published around the world.

 Drew Sage has been writing poetry since 1978. His style consists of an amalgamation of hip hop-like wordplay and iambic pentameter with a special emphasis on rhyming based on manipulated enunciation. He performs in up to 7 East Bay open mics a week.

Elisa Salasin wanders the hills with camera and pen when she isn’t wrestling spreadsheets for the good of the world. Her chapbook, She Watches Wild Horses, is a personal guidebook for sailing straight into the storm and coming out the other side shining.

 Maw Shein Win's full-length collection Percussing the Thinking Jar (Omnidawn) is forthcoming in October, 2024. She teaches poetry in the MFA Program at USF and is a co-founder of Maker, Mentor, Muse, a literary community. mawsheinwin.com

When she’s not taking classes from Hollie, Valerie Sopher sings, plays guitar and gets her hands dirty with fabric and thread. Her first chapbook, Day for Night, is available from The Orchard Street Press.

 Kimi Sugioka, is a mother, educator, songwriter, and author of two books of poetry; most recently Wile & Wing (Manic D Press). She is the poet laureate of Alameda, California, and believes that creating community through art is a revolutionary act.

 Vagabond Empire is a new multidisciplinary art project by Sam Prestianni that reimagines the Great American Songbook for a post-pandemic America. Check out the debut album at thevagabondempire.com and a poetry-painting collaboration at reneekirbyart.com/works-in-progress.html

SNS | 5-25-24

Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Hollie Hardy & Tomas Moniz

Theme: Feral
(scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday May 25, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 836 3483 2432

Passcode: 416346

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Author Bios

Hollie Hardy is a writer, educator, and author of Lions Like Us (forthcoming from Red Light Lit Press on June 7th, 2024) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press, 2014) winner of the Annual Poetry Center Book Award at San Francisco State University. She holds an MFA in Poetry from SFSU, teaches private writing workshops online, and hosts Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic, originally founded and co-hosted with Tomas Moniz. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals. She lives in Austin, TX. Learn more at: holliehardy.com

Tomas Moniz is a latinx writer living in East Oakland, CA. His debut novel, Big Familia, was a finalist for the 2020 PEN/Hemingway and the LAMBDA. His new novel, All Friends Are Necessary, is forthcoming from Algonquin Books on June 11th, 2024. He teaches at Berkeley City College and the Antioch MFA program. He has stuff on the internet but loves penpals:
PO Box 3555, Berkeley CA 94703. He promises to write back. Learn more at tomasmoniz.com

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, May 18, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

May Writing Prompt: Feral

adjective: feral
(especially of an animal) wild, untamed, undomesticated, escaped from captivity
or resembling an animal—savage, fierce, unpredictable, untamed

Brainstorm: Neglected garden, tangled fuchsia, feral wind reaching, tasting the hem of your garment, boy next door, teenaged crush, trampled with desire, hair-tearing grief, Texas summer nights, sticky animal aroma, her sharp teeth, this ocean roaring at the feral moon, like a dog abandoned on the median or loping in the back alleys of urban squalor searching for love.

Write a poem (or short prose piece) on or tangential to the theme, or including the word “feral”.

SOME IDEAS:

• Write about a feral animal or a zoo animal or an animal rescue or encounter

• Write about a wild animal heart, feral love, a feral crush

• An animal personified, or person described as animal

• Animal as metaphor

• What else is feral? A city, a garden, a schoolyard, a childhood, a jungle, an outfit, a Taylor Swift fan, a woman you loved, the music you danced to, the tongue of a hummingbird, the possibilities are endless

As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement; feel free to interpret loosely or ignore. The following sample poems offer a wildly diverse approach. Enjoy!

NOTE: The SNS writing prompts will soon be integrated into my new subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets

FOR INSPIRATION

Summer Story by Mary Oliver

It Was the Animals by Natalie Diaz

For the Feral Splendor That Remains by CA Conrad

She Had Some Horses by Joy Harjo

Studies of an Ox’s Heart, c. 1511-13 by Sylvia Legris

Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out by Richard Siken

Sanctuary by Donika Kelly

Happy Trigger by Carmen Giménez

Sea Krait, Broom by Amanda Joy

Emerald Spider Between Rose Thorns by Dean Young

Inside-Bird and Outside-Bird by Kim Hyesoon (translated by Don Mee Choi)

Summer by Joanna Fuhrman

James Dean with Pig by Sam Sax

Life Is Beautiful by Dorianne Laux

Allegory by Diane Seuss

NOTE: The SNS writing prompts will soon be integrated into my new subscription service, Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets

ATX Red Light Lit Poetry Open Mic

ATX Red Light Lit x Isis Destiny present a Lover Girl Open Mic at Revival
Indulge in an elevated open mic experience
in celebration of Red Light Lit Austin’s third anniversary

Featuring:

Music by Isis Destiny
Poetry by Hollie Hardy
+ local Austin poets and artists
&
books, body paint, henna, jewelry, live art
raffle prizes

Hosted By: Loria Mendoza

Red Light Lit is a reading series and small press devoted to writers, artists, and musicians who explore love, relationships, sexuality, and gender. Since its founding in 2013, RLL has published 10 literary journals and produced over 200 live shows (including in Austin, Chicago, Los Angeles, Portland, San Francisco, and Seattle).

Red Light Lit Press will release Hollie Hardy’s second full-length poetry collection Lions Like Us in May 2024. Preorder a signed copy here.

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Sunday, April 28, 2024
2pm - 6pm
(Readings at 3:30pm-ish)

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Revival Coffee
1405 East 7th Street
Austin, TX

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Free Event

SNS | 4-27-24

April is National Poetry Month! Join Saturday Night Special online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Dean Rader & Judy Halebsky

Theme: Fortune Cookie
(scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday April 27, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 856 5388 5137

Passcode: 852089

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Author Bios

Dean Rader has authored or co-authored twelve books, including Works & Days, winner of the 2010 T. S. Eliot Prize, Landscape Portrait Figure Form, a Barnes & Noble Review Best Book, and Self-Portrait as Wikipedia Entry, a finalist for the Oklahoma Book Award and the Northern California Book Award. Before the Borderless: Dialogues with the Art of Cy Twombly, was published in April of 2023 and was named one of ten “mesmerizing” books of modern poetry by Book Riot.  His writing has been supported by fellowships from Princeton University, Harvard University, Headlands Center for the Arts, Art Omi, and the MacDowell Foundation. Rader is a professor at the University of San Francisco and a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow in Poetry. 
Learn more at deanrader.com

Judy Halebsky is the author of three poetry collections—Sky=Empty, Tree Line,and Spring and a Thousand Years (Unabridged)—and the chapbook Space/Gap/Interval/Distance. Born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, she holds an M.F.A. in English & Creative Writing from Mills College and a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from the University of California, Davis. On fellowships from the Japanese Ministry of Culture, she spent five years living in Japan, where she trained in Butoh dance and Noh theatre. She now directs the low-residency MFA program at Dominican University of California.
Learn more at judyhalebsky.com

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, April 20, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

April Writing Prompt: Fortune Cookie

April is National Poetry Month and many of us are endeavoring to write a poem every day for 30 days! (Some of you are enrolled in my Poetry Challenge getting fresh prompts for inspiration) Let’s have a little fortune cookie fun [in bed]:

Write a poem (or short prose piece) inspired by the fortune cookie.

INCLUDE ONE (OR MORE) OF THE FOLLOWING:

• Adages

• Warnings / Predictions

• Tips / Advice / Instructions

• The words "in bed" at the end of each line or stanza (or some other repeated phrase)

• Confident, assertive, didactic, sarcastic or matter-of-fact tone

• Interpolated lines from a fortune cookie

• [Brackets] with fortune inside

• Made up fortunes (serious or ridiculous)

• Mention of a real or metaphorical fortune cookie

• Second person address (to the reader, as "you")

• A meal eaten alone or with someone else, which includes a fortune cookie

  (and perhaps some setting or narrative details)

Or something else! As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement; feel free to interpret loosely or ignore. Have fun!

FOR INSPIRATION

Fortune [The neighbors will soon spread their confounding potluck before you.] poem by Dobby Gibson

Fortune [There’s only one horizon, yet it can be found] poem by Dobby Gibson

Handy Guide poem by Dean Young

The Moral Kicks In poem by Peter Twal

Cardi B Tells Me about Myself poem by Eboni Hogan 

In Bed poem by Kim Addonizio

Lines For the Fortune Cookies poem by Frank O’Hara 

New Lines for Fortune Cookies poem by James Masao Mitsui

Your Luck Is about to Change poem by Susan Elizabeth Howe

Little God Origami poem by Stefi Weisburd

If You Go to Bed Hungry poem by Angela Narisco Torres 

One Page Salon

Join us on the patio for a lively evening of literary entertainment

Featuring:

Dale Bridges
Hollie Hardy
Greg Marshall
Sergio Muro
Bianca Alyssa Pérez

Hosted By: WLT Executive Director Becka Oliver

The One Page Salon (called “the best literary evening in town” by the Austin American-Statesman) is a monthly reading series presented by the Writers’ League of Texas.

Five outstanding writers will read one page from a work in progress, which means the audience will be among the first to hear new material from our talented line-up. Plus, there will be literary chit chat and fun & games and laughter and so much more.

The One Page Salon takes place on the lovely outdoor patio (weather permitting) at Radio Coffee & Beer in South Austin where attendees can enjoy coffee and beer and other libations. There are some tasty food trucks if you want to pick up a bite to eat and Reverie Books will be on hand selling an assortment of great reads, including our readers’ latest books. Come early to save your seat!

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Tuesday, April 2, 2024
7:30 pm

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Radio Coffee & Beer
4204 Menchaca Rd
Austin, TX

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Free Event

SNS | 3-30-24

Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Kelechi Ubozoh & Meg Jerit

Theme: The Sauce
(scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday March 30, 2024
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 810 1670 2337

Passcode: 864243

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Author Bios

Kelechi Ubozoh is a Nigerian-American writer and mental health advocate. Originally from Brooklyn, New York, she was the first undergraduate published in The New York Times. Her book with LD Green, We’ve Been Too Patient, elevates marginalized voices of lived experience who have endured psychiatric mistreatment. Her work is featured in Argot Magazine, Multiplicity, Essential Truths, sParkle & bLINK, Trauma, Tresses, & Truth, and When We Exhale. She co-hosts the Bay Area reading series MoonDrop Productions with Cassandra Dallett and has received a Pushcart Prize nomination. 
Learn more at kelechiubozoh.com. IG: @specialkech

Meg Jerit is a creative nonfiction writer, editor, poet, and author of the commissioned children’s book The Moonies: Journey to the Total Solar Eclipse. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from Columbia College, where she wrote her memoir, River Talks, a bildungsroman set in her hometown of Memphis, Tennessee. In 2022, she attended the Kenyon Review Summer Writing Workshop. Her poetry and prose has appeared in various journals such as, Adelaide: International Literary Magazine, Allium: A Journal of Poetry & Prose, The Commercial Appeal, The Southwestern Review, and forthcoming from Take Heart Publications. She is also the host of Smushed Blueberries, a monthly reading series at Epoch Coffee, in Austin, TX.  megjerit.com IG: @megitate @smushedblueberries

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, March 23, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

March Writing Prompt: The Sauce

The many meanings of “sauce” include zest, zing, juice, confidence, style, salsa, rizz. It’s the slippery goodness that holds things together. It’s not just hot sauce, tomato, bbq, mustard, mayo, peanut, cherry, chocolate, sriracha, and soy—it’s all the sauces. And their metaphors. All the saucy people and things. Like salsa dancing. Sauce can also mean alcohol—like on or off the sauce, sauced.

Tell us a sauce story; sing us a saucy song; show us your salsa, write us a poem with some sauce in it!

SOME IDEAS TO GET YOU STARTED:

• Write about a “secret sauce,” literal or metaphorical

• Write about something spicy or zesty—a food, an outfit, a date

• Write about “the goodness that holds things together”

• Write about salsa dancing or traditional dance, or the musical side of the sauce

• Write about (a character with) “rizz” (Oxford’s 2023 Word of the Year)

Or something else! As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement, feel free to interpret loosely or ignore.

FOR INSPIRATION:

The Sauce, a Spotify playlist, short and saucy, to get you in the mood

Victims of the Latest Dance Craze, poem by Cornelius Eady

Calligraphy Accompanied by the Mood of a Calm but Definitive Sauce, poem by Dick Allen

Harold's Chicken Shack #1, poem by Nate Marshall

My Mouth Hovers Across Your Breasts, poem by Adrienne Rich

Wild Tongue, poem by Rebecca Seiferle

November Philosophers, by Katie Ford

Chinese Silence No. 14, poem by Timothy Yu

Tarragon, Are You a Wild Boar?, poem by Vi Khi Nao

Rats, short prose by Matthew Sweeney

SNS | 2-24-24

Join us online for an evening of literary performance and open mic reading

Featuring: Roanna Flowers & SG Huerta

Theme: Love (scroll down for writing prompt)

Hosted By: Hollie Hardy

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Saturday February 24, 2023
6:00pm Pacific Time
(8:00pm Central time)

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Online Event
Free Admission

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Sign Up in Advance to Get on the Open Mic List

The theme is optional | Time limit is not optional
Please plan ahead and keep your reading to 3 MINUTES MAX
Scroll down for monthly writing prompt

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Join Event on Zoom

Meeting ID: 897 8202 8736

Passcode: 447624

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Author Bios

Roanna Flowers is a comedy writer in Austin, Texas. She has written several award-winning comedic short films, one of which appeared in over 30 festivals world-wide including the Cannes Short Film Corner. Last November, her short story "These Boots. Or The Bitches of Eastwick" appeared in the short story anthology "Mixed Bag of Tricks," a collection of stories by women, about women, published by a woman-owned small press. She is a former student of Amanda Eyre Ward’s, author of "The Jetsetters," and a member of the Writers’ League of Texas. She has a B.A. in English Literature with a specialization in early British Literature and a surprisingly handy minor in Latin. roannaflowers.com

SG Huerta is a queer Xicanx writer from Dallas. They are the poetry editor of Abode Press and marketing co-director for Split Lip Magazine. SG is the author of two poetry chapbooks, The Things We Bring with Us (Headmistress Press) and Last Stop (Defunkt Magazine), and the forthcoming nonfiction chapbook GOOD GRIEF (fifth wheel press 2025). Their work has appeared in Barrelhouse, Honey Literary, Infrarrealista Review, and elsewhere. They live in Central Texas with their partner and two cats. sghuertawriting.com

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Write with Friends! Register for The Write-In!

LET’S WORK ON THE THEME TOGETHER!

Join me the week before SNS, on Saturday afternoon, February 17, for the monthly Write-In, a generative online workshop with Hollie Hardy.

Write-In Details/ Sign Up

February Writing Prompt:

The theme of love is simple, classic, eternal, and offers a myriad of entry points. There’s romantic love, hungry love, familial love, friendship love, pet love, monster love, lost love, twisted love, unrequited love, self love. There’s new love and seasoned love. Fleeting and forever love.

Tell us a love story; sing us a love song; write us a love poem; compose a love letter.

SOME IDEAS TO GET YOU STARTED:

• Write about desire using metaphors about food, eating, or drinking. 

• Write a letter poem to a lover or friend about the terribly urgent, wonderful things you must tell them. 

• Write about your/or a character’s best, worst, or ideal date.

• Write a list poem repeating the word "because" or "reasons"

  because of my love for you____
  because I think of you____
  because you are mine____ 
  reasons I love you____

• Write about lost or unrequited love, about breaking up, missing or remembering someone. 

• Write a love story from the point of view of a mythical creature

• Write a how-to poem or essay about love

As ever, the theme is optional—an invitation, not a requirement, feel free to interpret loosely or ignore.

FOR INSPIRATION:

Love Sonnet XI, by Pablo Neruda
Having a Coke with You, by Frank O’Hara
The Friend, by Marge Piercy
To Love as Aswang, by Barbara Jane Reyes
What the Living Do, by Marie Howe
A Bronze God, or a Letter on Demand, Clifton Gachagua
What I Might Carry in the Small Cave of My Mouth +
How to Write a Love Letter by MK Chavez

Sign up for the February Write-In Workshop

A Writer’s Party Online Open Mic

This open mic is the culmination of a multi-day event billed as a free alternative to AWP including online and in-person events in Philly. Join Q&As, workshops, readings, music, a book fair, and more!
Open to all: Feb 8 - Feb 11. RSVP to individual events and panels here

Featuring:

Norm Maddox
Hollie Hardy
Kelechi Ubozoh
Natasha Dennerstein
Tongo Eisen-Martin

Hosted By: K.R. Morrison

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Sunday, February 11, 2023
5pm Central/ 6pm Eastern

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Advanced Registration Required
Click here to RSVP

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Free

Red Light Lit Austin

Join us for an evening of poetry, prose, live music, burlesque, and more on the theme of love.

Featuring:

Hollie Hardy
&
local Austin poets and performance artists (tba)

Hosted By: Loria Mendoza

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Saturday, Feb 10, 2024
10 pm

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Stinson Hall
10203 Old Manchaca Rd
Austin, TX

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RSVP on Eventbrite
$20 suggested donation
(no one turned away)