Susan Kelly-DeWitt and Mary Barbara Moore
The Poetry Reading Series is proud to feature two outstanding poets: Mary Barbara Moore (visiting from West Virginia), and Susan Kelly-DeWitt. Both will read on Thursday, August 3rd at 8 P.M. They will be performing at the John Natsoulas Gallery at 521 1st Street in Davis.
Mary Barbara Moore began giving poetry readings in Sacramento and Davis in the late 1980s, and returns to us after a multi-decade hiatus. For many years Mary Moore taught literature classes (poetry, Renaissance literature, women’s literature, modernism), and expository writing at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia. She has published three books of poetry.
A native Californian now living in Appalachia, Mary Moore has published poetry widely. Moore’s poems have appeared lately in Georgia Review, Birmingham Poetry Review (BPR), One, Cider Press Review, McNeese Review, Terrain (Contest Finalist), Canary, Coal Hill Review, Poem/Memoir/Story, Unsplendid, the Indolent Books political blog, “What Rough Beast,” and Atlanta Review. Previous credits include Poetry, Field, New Letters, Prairie Schooner, Nimrod, Negative Capability, Quercus, Mockingbird and other little magazines.
Mary B. Moore’s recent poetry books include her second full-length collection Flicker (Broadkill River Press, 2016), winner of the 2016 Dogfish Head Poetry Award judged by Carol Frost, Baron Wormser, and Jan Beatty; and Eating the Light (Sable Books, 2016), chosen by Allison Joseph for the Sable 2016 chapbook contest. A poetry book, The Book of Snow, came out from Cleveland State U. Poetry Center in 1997, and a critical book, Desiring Voices, Women Sonneteers and Petrarchism, came out in 2000 from Southern Illinois University Press. Sandra M. Gilbert has written, “The reach and range of Mary Moore’s aesthetic ambition are breathtaking, sometimes heart-stopping.”
Opening for Mary Moore will be Susan Kelly-DeWitt. Kelly-DeWitt is the author of many books, most recently Spider Season from Cold River Press (2016). About this book, Jane Mead has said, “The poems in Susan Kelly-DeWitt’s Spider Season reflect our human desire to weave the inner and outer worlds into an ordered pattern: like the spider’s web, these poems are delicate, made of strong filament, and vulnerable—impermanence proves to be a force as strong as the desire for order. This book beautifully renders the process, rewards and disappointments of this universal human struggle.”
Earlier publications of Susan Kelly-DeWitt include The Fortunate Islands (Marick Press, 2008), A Camellia for Judy (Frith Press, 1998), Feather’s Hand (Swan Scythe Press, 2000), To A Small Moth (Poet’s Corner Press, 2001), Susan Kelly-DeWitt’s Greatest Hits (Pudding House, 2003), The Land (Rattlesnake Press, 2005), The Book of Insects (Spruce Street Press, 2003), Cassiopeia Above the Banyan Tree (Rattlesnake Press, 2007), and an illustrated short story The Audience (Uptown Books, 2007).
An open mic will follow the readings by our featured poets. Please bring your poems, short stories, and songs. Participants will be asked to limit their performances to five minutes or two items, whichever is shorter. The Poetry Night Reading Series is hosted by Dr. Andy Jones, the poet laureate of Davis, and is made possible by his many interns, many of whom graduate in 2017 and will be missed.
Media Contact: Andy Jones
aojones@gmail.com
The John Natsoulas Gallery – (530) 756-3938
Please visit the Facebook page for this event:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1926135240963004/
You are also invited to join the poetry in Davis Facebook group mailing list:
https://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2290130152&ref=ts
