10/2 Book Launch & Poetry Reading: Baldinger, Flynn, macross, Wright @ White Whale

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2…

Jason Baldinger will be launching his newest book at White Whale and reading alongside fabulous local poets April Flynn, miss macross, and visiting poet Daniel W. Wright!

JASON BALDINGER is a poet from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was recently a Writer in Residence at Osage Arts Community, and is founder and co-director of The Bridge Series. He has multiple books available including the soon to be released The Better Angels of our Nature (Kung Fu Treachery) and the split books The Ugly Side of the Lake with John Dorsey (Night Ballet Press) as well as Everyone’s Alone Tonight with James Benger (Kung Fu Treachery Press). His work has been published widely in print journals and online. You can listen to him read his work on Bandcamp on lps by the bands Theremonster and The Gotobeds.

APRIL FLYNN was born in Louisville, Kentucky, where she was promptly dressed in a bikini due to liver problems. Between then and now she has been a bunch of places and learned and forgotten many things. For instance, she knows how to make frozen spinach palatable and speaks a little bit of Russian. Only one cat has ever disliked her. She can’t draw. She isn’t good with mornings but she’s pretty good in a crisis. A man standing in the road outside a bar in Pittsburgh once mistook her for a demon, or maybe just a very severe angel, though in reality she prefers temperance and moderation. She has a lot of Pisces in her chart, but her sun is in Taurus. In this past year alone, she has shaken hands with the Pennsylvania governor, helped explain the history of country music to West Virginia police officers, and danced with raccoons.

miss macross is a multi-genre writer, workshop organizer for Girls Write Pittsburgh, and host of the Hell’s Lid Reading Series. She was selected by The Incline as part of their 2018 class for “Who’s Next in Pittsburgh Art.” Her work has been published in over 30 literary magazines and anthologies. She has published two chapbooks: MISS MACROSS VS. BATMAN (CWP Collective Press, 2018) and THE MIDNIGHT PRINCESS (2019).

DANIEL W. WRIGHT is a Midwestern son who loves and loathes the red brick town that surrounds him. A poet of the no-collar work force, Wright previously served on the board of independent literary magazine River Styx, and his work has appeared in Gasconade Review, Bad Jacket, Acid Kat, Crappy Hour, Eleven, The Dope Fiend Daily, Under the Bleachers, and The Rye Whiskey Review. His works include Rodeo of the Soul, The Death of the Ladies Man, Small Town Blues: Early Lyrics and Poems, Portrait, Murder City Special, and Working Bohemian’s Blues. Wright currently lives in St. Louis, MO, where you can usually find him in a bar or a bookstore.

7/7 Hell’s Lid Reading Series: July @ Full Pint Wild Side Pub

2 PM SUNDAY, July 7…

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! Hosted by Ｍｉｓｓ　Ｍａｃｒｏｓｓ. July’s lineup includes:

Tai Chirovsky
Janette Schafer
Ben Smiley
Angele Ellis
Rita Staci B
Cal LaFountain
Tera McIntosh

This is a free event, but donations for the performers are greatly appreciated. Hell’s Lid is an inclusive and accessible event.

6/2 Hell’s Lid Reading Series @ Full Pint Wild Side Pub

2 PM SUNDAY…

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! Hosted by Ｍｉｓｓ　Ｍａｃｒｏｓｓ. June’s lineup includes:

Shanna Alden
GS Murphy
Jason Baldinger
feeble organs
Anna Eidolon

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

4/13 Poetry Fundraiser for & @ Millvale Community Library

5PM SATURDAY…

April is National Poetry Month, and April 7th-13th is National Library Week! Support the Millvale Community Library by attending our 2nd annual poetry fundraiser. Admission for this event is $5. All proceeds will benefit our after-school meal program.

Lineup includes:

Stephen Lin
Shan Soleil
Mattie Hyer
Chelsea Margaret Bodnar
James Croal Jackson
Bob Walicki

Event hosted by Ｍｉｓｓ　Ｍａｃｒｏｓｓ

3/23 Free Fucking Poems About Fucking @ Glitter Box Theater

7:30 SATURDAY

Welcome, fuckers, to the latest installation in FREE POEMS – FREE FUCKING POEMS ABOUT FUCKING. This time it’s about fucking.

Headlining Fuckers:
David Graham/ Requiem
Cherri Baum
Noel Pabillo Mariano
Chelsea Margaret Bodnar
John Thomas
Sundae Service
Kelly Boyker
Bebe Beretta
Michael Todd Schneider
Nikki Palmer

With face painting by Hanna Wilford! Get a dick or a vagina or some boobies or a butt plug or whatever painted on your face!

Also with poems/performances by: Ｍｉｓｓ　Ｍａｃｒｏｓｓ, Art Ettinger, Ed Pinto, Jeff Boyle, Kelly Lorraine Andrews, Nathan Moore, Olivia Devorah, Philip Kunkle, Sarah B Boyle, Shawn Maddey and a very very very (very) special performance from Peter Zumpano

And featuring like 20 other assholes we’ll have a list of eventually like fuck man this is a lot of work.

We’re changing up venues this time and will be fucking off at The Glitter Box Theater on Saturday, March 23rd for all the fucking you can handle, and a lot you probably can’t.

FREE FUCKING POEMS is an arts anarchy event themed around….wait for it…FUCKING, and vaguely around poetry.

If you have been solicited for a poem in the FREE FUCKING POEMS ABOUT FUCKING anthology, congratulations, you’re a performer! Let us know (here, via email, or via PM) if you plan to come out and share your fuck on stage so we can schedule a time slot for you to alienate all of your friends!

As always, there will be open stage time for anyone who writes and wants to read a (one, singular) fuck poem of their very own! We’ll let you know how we’re gonna deal with that closer to the event itself. Probably a sign up sheet. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it

JUST A HEADS UP YOU WILL SEE AT LEAST 1 DICK. LIKE, A REAL ONE NOT A PICTURE OF ONE AND PROBABLY LOTS OF OTHER GENITALS. SOMEONE GETS WEIRD ABOUT THIS AT EVERY FREE POEMS SO HERE IT IS IN CAPS RIGHT NOW. DICK DICK DICK DICK 8==D

FAQs

Q. How can I help/add to the FREE FUCKING experience?
A. We are so glad you asked! Oh my! How kind of you! We need help with everything from live-streaming the event to bringing beer and liquor, to bringing extra toilet paper (I cannot imagine Glitterbox is prepared for the amount of tp this event seems to go through), to bringing snacks! Closer to the event we will post a wish list, but if there is something you super duper want to bring my goodness, but we shall be chuffed!

Q. Can I sell/buy something/give you money/participate in late stage capitalism in any capacity at FREE POEMS?
A. No.

Q. What the fuck is FREE POEMS?
A. We don’t fucking know. FREE POEMS has happened 3 times now. It was born of a desire to giggle but also shed as much pretense and opportunism and FUCKING FASCISM from the experience of creative communion as possible and put a bunch of our genius but often overlooked friends all in a room at once and watch them be amazed by each other. First time was SNAKES, next was MONSTERS, then came JESUS. Now we’re here. We put together a book, too. We don’t fucking know.

Q. Can I read/perform at FREE POEMS?
A. I guess. Idk. Do you fuck? In all seriousness, yes there is open mic time integrated into FREE POEMS every year. You don’t need to let us know ahead of time if you will want to sign up, just show up and find the list. There is a time limit of one poem/2 minutes per person, though, so do keep that in mind.

Q. What is considered a poem at FREE POEMS?
A. Your question should probably be “what isn’t considered a poem?” because pretty much anything you want to read/perform/do on stage is a poem at FREE POEMS, provided it is on theme (fucking)

Q. I know a poet/band/trapeze artist/sex doll that would be perfect for your event! Can they perform?
A. If they can squeeze it into 2 minutes! Our lineup and the poems we put in the FREE POEMS book are all solicited, but the best way to get a featured spot/solicitation at a subsequent event, is to show up at FREE POEMS and do a thing on stage during open mic time. It is not by giving us beer or press or bj’s. That said, definitely give us beer. Maybe press. We can get our own bj’s tho, thanks. We’re not players we just crush a lot.

Q. Can I bring my kid?
A. LOL no not this time. We are legit going to show porn probably. Leave the kid at home for fuck’s sake. Even if they are 17. When they turn 18 take them to get their nipples pierced and bring them to FREE POEMS.

Q. Are there rules about content at FREE POEMS?
A. Your poem or performance must, in some way, be about/contain/depict FUCKING. Otherwise, we eschew censorship, so also keep that in mind as an audience member – people are probably going to say shit that makes you feel weird (good weird and bad weird). It’s ok to step outside if you get the vapors. And if you’re still mad at us after you get some air, it’s ok to go home and leave us the fuck alone, we’ll never get along.

DISCLAIMER: We shouldn’t have to say this, but alas. I don’t give a fuck what the content of someone’s performance is – don’t touch anyone without express consent to do so and don’t be a mean gross creeper. Also don’t fuck shame anyone for what they share. We have a bouncer named Rocco (seriously) and we are not afraid to use him.

DISCLAIMER #2: it occurred to Margaret when she was taking a shower yesterday that we should probably mention that this is not a play party or a swinger thing, it’s really honestly actually an art event. I mean, I hope someone goes home with someone else’s wife or something, and while you CAN spank someone at FREE POEMS (with consent, see disclaimer #1), we’re kind of here for art, too.

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.