11/8 Poetry Reading: Burroughs / Baldinger / Pavey @ Visible Voice Books

7:30 PM FRIDAY in Cleveland…

Shawn Pavey has delivered newspapers, mowed lawns, bagged groceries, cut meat, laid sewer pipe, bussed tables, washed dishes, roofed houses, crunched numbers, rented cars, worked in hotels, worn an apron at Kinko’s, and been paid to write everything from résumés to music reviews. Currently, he earns a living as an Executive Recruiter in Mission, KS where he lives with his wife and two worthless but adorable cats. He’s hosted poetry readings in bars, coffee shops, haunted houses, bookstores, libraries, front porches, seedy motel rooms, and abandoned warehouses. He is the author of Talking to Shadows (2008, Main Street Rag Press),Nobody Steals the Towels from a Motel 6 (2015, Spartan Press), and Survival Tips for the Pending Apocalypse(Spartan Press, 2019). He is a Co-founder and former Associate Editor of The Main Street Rag Literary Journal, and a former board member and officer of The Writers Place, a Kansas City-based literary non-profit. His poems, essays, and journalism appear in a variety of national and regional publications. A graduate of the University of North Carolina’s Undergraduate Honors Creative Writing Program, he likes his Tom Waits loud, his bourbon single-barrel, and his basketball Carolina Blue.

Jason Baldinger is a poet from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A recent Writer in Residence at Osage Arts Community, he is co-founder and co-director of The Bridge Series. He has multiple books available including The Better Angels of our Nature (Kung Fu Treachery) and Everyone’s Alone Tonight with James Benger (Kung Fu Treachery Press). He has done collaboration work with the poets John Dorsey and Charles Cicirella – the latter can be heard on Bandcamp under the moniker Commissioner Gordon. His work has been published widely in print journals and online. You can listen to him read his work on Bandcamp and on lps by the bands Theremonster and The Gotobeds.

John Burroughs of Cleveland is the 2019-2021 Beat Poet Laureate for the state of Ohio. He is a dynamic performer who has wowed audiences from Oakland to New York City and myriad points in between. His more than a dozen books include Rattle and Numb: Selected Poems, 1992-2019 (2019, Venetian Spider Press) and Loss and Foundering (2018, NightBallet Press). He hosts the monthly Poetry+ reading series at Art on Madison in Lakewood, Ohio, and has served since 2008 as the founding editor for Crisis Chronicles Press, publishing over one hundred books by esteemed writers from around the world. Find him on Facebook, Twitter (@jesuscrisis) or at www.crisischronicles.com.

This event is free.

11/4 Hell’s Lid Reading Series @ Full Pint Wild Side Pub

2PM SUNDAY…

“[T]he wind would force the smoky curtains aside, and the whole black expanse would be dimly lighted with dull wreaths of fire…if any one would enjoy a spectacle as striking as Niagara, he may do so by simply walking up a long hill to Cliff Street in Pittsburg, and looking over into – hell with the lid taken off.” – James Parton, The Atlantic Monthly, January 1868
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Check out the best poets, writers, and spoken word artists in and around the city on the first Sunday of every month at the awesome Full Pint Wild Side Pub in Lawrenceville!

Our November readers include:

Alyssa Herron
Bob Walicki
Kara Knickerbocker
John Burroughs
Nicole Onda Grynd
Joshua Tarquinio
Sarah Washburn Thornton

This is a free event, but donations for the performers are greatly appreciated.

 

4/16 Brews-Zing Poetry w/ Burroughs, Borsenik, Baldinger & Dorsey @ Brews

4PM MONDAY in Eureka Springs…

Dynamic Cleveland-area poets John Burroughs and Dianne Borsenik perform at the perfect venue, Brews in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. Update: They will be joined by Jason Baldinger (of Pittsburgh) and John Dorsey (of Belle, Missouri).

John Burroughs is a nationally-touring poet and performer from the Cleveland area and the author of over a dozen books including Water Works, Electric Company, Beat Attitude and The Eater of the Absurd. His latest, Loss and Foundering, will be published in Spring 2018 by NightBallet Press. In various past lives, John served as playwright-in-residence for the Ministry of Theatre at Marion Correctional Institution, his blog was ranked #1 on MySpace, he won the first poetry slam he ever competed in, and he co-founded (with Dianne Borsenik) the infamous Lix and Kix Poetry Extravaganza and almost-annual Snoetry: A Winter Wordfest. John has edited numerous volumes, including the Oct Tongue poetry series, Cheap and Easy Magazine and the anti-censorship anthology Fuck Poetry, and he is probably most proud of his work since 2008 as the founding editor of Crisis Chronicles Press. Find him at www.crisischronicles.com.

Dianne Borsenik is active in the Ohio poetry scene and regional reading circuit. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including Chiron Review, The Offbeat, Slipstream, Rosebud, The Ramingo’s Porch, and Pudding Magazine, with work forthcoming in Poems-For-All and Conclave. Crisis Chronicles Press published her first full length collection, Age of Aquarius, in 2016, and published a collection of thirty-one of her poems as part of Oct Tongue 2 in 2017. Editor and designer at NightBallet Press, Borsenik has published over one hundred titles for poets across the United States. Lit Youngstown printed her poem “Disco” on their tee shirts, which makes her feel like a rock star. Find her at www.dianneborsenik.com.

Jason Baldinger is a poet hailing from Pittsburgh. He’s the author of several books the most recent of which, the chaplet, Fumbles Revelations (Grackle and Crow) is available now, and the collection Fragments of a Rainy Season (Six Gallery Press) which is coming summer 2018. Recent publications include the Low Ghost Anthology Unconditional Surrender, The Dope Fiend Daily, Uppagus, Lilliput Review, Rusty Truck, Dirtbag Review, In Between Hangovers, Your One Phone Call, Winedrunk Sidewalk, Anti-Heroin Chic, Nerve Cowboy Concrete Meat Press, Zombie Logic Press, Ramingo’s Porch, Blue Mountain Review, Red Fez, Blue Hour Review and Heartland! Poetry of Love, Solidarity and Resistance. You can hear Jason read some poems on recent and forthcoming releases by Theremonster and Sub Pop Recording artist The Gotobeds as well as at jasonbaldinger.bandcamp.com.

John Dorsey has been writing poetry since the late 1980s and has been involved in the publishing community for more than two decades. He is the author of around 50 books and chapbooks, a few of the most recent being Being the Fire (Tangerine Press, 2016) and Shoot the Messenger (Red Flag Press, 2017), the latter was funded by Indiana University of Pennsylvania’s English Department. A nine-time Pushcart Prize nominee, his work has appeared more than 2,000 magazines and anthologies from around the world. He has read or spoken at colleges and universities such as the University of Toledo, Assumption College, Cleveland State University, Seton Hill University, University of the Arts, Erie Community College, Southeast Missouri State University, and Indiana University of Pennsylvania, as well as other assorted venues covering 49 states. For several years Dorsey served as a judge for the Arts Commission of Greater Toledo’s Art in Tarta Project, which chose poems to be presented on city transit buses. In 2006, he won the Toledo City Paper’s annual poetry and fiction competition, and would go on to serve as a judge the following year, before being named the city’s Best Literary Artist in their 2014 reader poll. In 2010, he also served as a judge for Grievous Jones Press’ Grievous Prize issued in Cardiff, Wales, and in 2013 for the Standing Rock Cultural Arts Open Chapbook Competition in Kent, Ohio. From 2003-2012, he served as an Artist-in-Residence at the Collingwood Arts Center in Toledo, Ohio and In 2015, Dorsey was awarded a Visiting Artist Residency by the Osage Arts Community in Belle, MO, where he currently resides. In 2017 he received a two appointment to serve as Belle’s first city Poet Laureate from Mayor Steve Vogt and has gone on to found the city’s first literary publication the Gasconade Review, which he edits with Jason Ryberg. He is a graduate of the University of Arts’ Writing for Film and Television program, completing his education there in 2002, and 2017 he served as the subject for a poetry documentary by NYC filmmaker Carson Parish. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com

6/15 CWP Presents InTENse Poetry! @ Mac’s Backs

6:30PM THURSDAY…

Cringe-Worthy Poets Collective presents InTENse Poetry! Initially featuring TEN poets from New Jersey westward, we’ve inTENtionally added one more to make it a glorious Baker’s Decade of Poets! And, oh yeah, baby, our collective inTENsion is to bring it and sling it!

Nathanael Stolte (Buffalo)
Ben Brindise (Buffalo)
Damian Rucci (New Jersey)
Jason Baldinger (Pittsburgh)
Jennifer Skelton (Buffalo)
Julio Valentin (Buffalo)
Misty Becerra (Buffalo)
John Burroughs (Cleveland)
Richard L. Gegick (Pittsburgh)
Dianne Borsenik (Cleveland)
RA Washington (Cleveland)

East comes together with Midwest in one of Cleveland’s most beloved venues, the venerated Mac’s Backs on Coventry. We welcome you to come, get inTENse with us, as we celebrate life and the pow-pow-POWER of poetry!

10/6 Monday @ Mahall’s feat. Jason Baldinger

THIS MONDAY at 7:30…

Join us for a night of poetry, music and community as we celebrate the release of Lipsmack!: A Sampler Platter of Poets from NightBallet Press Year 3. Featured poets will include contributors Jennifer Hambrick (from Columbus), Andy Roberts (Columbus), Jason Baldinger (Pittsburgh), Dan Smith (Cleveland) and perhaps a surprise or two, followed by an open mic. John Burroughs will emcee, joined by Lipsmack! editor and NightBallet publisher Dianne Borsenik.

 

2/8 A Confluence of Poets @ Modern Formations

This is happening in ONE WEEK:

UPDATE 2/6

From City Paper‘s Short List:

Tonight, Pittsburgh’s singular Lilliput Review puts poetry on the map — or maybe makes a map out of poetry — with A Confluence of Poets. The reading at ModernFormations Gallery spotlights poets from six cities, with a Rust Belt focus. Readers include: Sara Ries, of Buffalo; Chuck Joy (Erie); Diane Borsenik and John Burroughs (Cleveland); Ally Malinenko and John Grochalski (New York City); Maggie Glover (San Francisco); and Heather McNaugher, Kristofer Collins and Lilliput’s own Don Wentworth (Pittsburgh). BO 8 p.m. 4919 Penn Ave., Garfield. $5 or covered dish.

9/27 Rustbelt Exchange @ EEBX

Jason Baldinger, John Dorsey, Steve Brightman, John Burroughs & Dianne Borsenik are coming to EEBX, marking the first time Cleveland poets have been allowed to perform poetry in Pittsburgh in nearly five decades. Attend this reading & support the peace process.

6/22/13 Lix & Kix aka Crisis Chronicles/Night Ballet Press @ EEBX

Saturday, June 22nd @ 7PM @ EEBX, 6GP’s Jason Baldinger will host a FREE performance by local & nonlocal poets.

Pittsburgh’s dynamic duo

Renée Alberts & Nikki Allen

join forces with Cleveland’s small press superteam

John Burroughs & Dianne Borsenik

to fight the crime of not having an awesome reading.

Learn more @ Bookface. BYOB.