Featured painting: Caterwaul; Oil and Watercolor on Linen; 80" x 64"; 2021 by Hannah Barnes
To be a poet, to my mind, is to be aware, as I once read in a children’s book about the five senses: to ‘see all there is to see, hear all there is to hear, smell all there is to smell, taste all there is to taste, touch all there is to touch.’ To pay attention; to be curious and alert; to be receptive and reflective, reverent and irreverent, romantic and skeptical; to mourn and to praise; to contemplate, celebrate, and salvage what we can of the universe, on behalf of our species. To be a poet, then, is no more or less than to be fully human and to translate and distill that experience into language so meticulously as to evoke and redeem something of life itself.
—from “The Edge: Of Motherhood and Poetics,” Homing In: Attempts on a Life of Poetry and Purpose
Upcoming Events and Readings
Saturday, September 13, 2025, 7:30-9:30PM Stories of Bodily Autonomy, Story Parlor, Asheville, NC
Friday, September 19, 2025, 7:30-10PM Juniper Bends, with Jasmin Pittman, Tony Robles and Ann Harris, Story Parlor, Asheville, NC
Saturday, September 20, 2025, 9-10:15AM Punch Bucket Lit Fest, with Michael Hettich, Andrew Mack, and Sebastian Matthews, The Renaissance Hotel, 31 Woodfin St, Asheville, NC
Friday, September 26, 2025, 7PM"How to Recover Awe: Poets in the Wake of Helene" Post-Helene Symposium “Remembering, Rebuilding and Reimagining,” UNC Asheville, with Nickole Brown, Chelsea White-Hoglen, and Daniel Suber, Zillocoah Beer Company, 870 Riverside Drive, Woodfin, NC
October 16, 2025, With Mildred Barya, Blacksburg Books, Blacksburg, VA
October 25, 2025, Had I A Dove, Helene Anthology Reading, Blackburg Books, Blacksburg, VA
Wednesday, January 14, 2026 with Sebastian Matthews, The Brandy Bar, Hendersonville, NC
Past Events:
Friday, April 11, 2025, 9AM Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies Conference, Virginia Tech Graduate Life Center, Blacksburg, VA
Saturday, April 12, 2025, 7PM Mackenzie Kozak Book Launch, Story Parlor, Asheville, NC
Wednesday, April 16, 2025, 5:30PM with Sophia Terazawa, Moss Arts Center, Blackburg, VA
Thursday, April 17, 2025, 7PM Blacksburg Books, Blacksburg, VA
Sunday, May 4, 2025, 4:30PM Malaprop's Books, Asheville, NC
Sunday, May 25, 2025, 7PM Book Launch Barn Party, Christmas Tree Farm, Leicester, NC
Saturday, August 9th, 2025, 3PM with Michael Dechane and Mackenzie Kozak, City Lights Bookstore, Sylva, NX
Sunday, August 10th, 2025 with Sebastian Matthews, Scuppernong Books, Greensboro, NC
Sunday, August 17, 2025, 6PM with Mackenzie Kozak, Buxton Books, Charleston, SC
Saturday, April 5th, 2025, 10:00AM Collegeville Institute Popup Writing Workshop
Saturday, September 21, 2024 Punch Bucket Lit Festival, Asheville, NC
10:00 AM to 11:15AM Panel: “Literary Citizenship: Engaging Communities” with Luke Hankins, Delicia Daniels, Barbara Roether, and Christian Detisch (Renaissance Hotel - Ballroom C2)
4:00 PM to 5:15 PM Wet Cement Reading with Thoreau Lovell, Chengru He, Barbara Roether, Tony-Wallin Sato, Susan M. Shultz, (Renaissance Hotel -Ballroom C2)
Sunday, September 10, 2023 at 5PM Word Play Radio, Asheville FM, 103.3
Thursday, September 14, 2023 at 7PM Jazz Hybrid Presents an Evening of Poetry & Music. Story Parlor, 227 Haywood Road, West Asheville.
Sunday, September 17, 2023, 7PM Poetry as Consolation wsg Brit Washburn. An online workshop and discussion. Sliding scale.
Thursday, October 5, 2023, 6PM Juniper Bends Reading Series, Citizen Vinyl, 14 O'Henry Ave., Asheville
Sunday, October 15, 2023 5PM Writers at Home, Malaprop’s Bookstore, Asheville
Friday, November 17, Story Parlor