Poetry Night via ZOOM! Join us at 8 PM on Thursday, March 4th, 2021.
Dear Friends of Poetry,
Spring comes early to Californians, and with the new season comes a crop of new books, including fresh publications from a Davis memoirist and poet, and from the poet laureate emeritus of Sacramento. At 8 PM on Thursday, March 4th, the only date on the calendar that is a complete sentence, friends, readers, and admirers will gather together for a poetry reading via ZOOM. To participate, visit https://ucdavisdss.zoom.us/my/andyojones at 8 PM, or a few minutes before if you wish to chat with the host and the other attendees.
This short (30ish-minute) reading will feature poetry by Andrea Ross and Indigo Moor. Please join us Thursday, and try to arrive on time, for, as May Sarton says, “In the novel you get the journey. In a poem you get the arrival.” May Sarton
Andrea Ross is a Davis poet, essayist, and faculty member in the University Writing Program at UC Davis. Once a park service ranger and wilderness guide, Andrea Ross has been awarded several California Arts Council residencies and a fellowship at the Mesa Refuge. Her work can be found in Ploughshares, Terrain, the Café Review, and the Dirtbag Diaries Podcast. She lives in Davis, California with her husband and son. Find out more about Andrea at andrearosswriter.com.
Adopted at birth, Andrea Ross grew up inhabiting two ecosystems: one was her tangible, adoptive family, the other her birth family, whose mysterious landscape was hidden from her. In her new coming-of-age memoir, Unnatural Selection(Published March 2nd, 2021), Ross narrates how in her early twenties, while working as a ranger in Grand Canyon National Park, she embarked on a journey to discover where she came from and, ultimately, who she was. After many missteps and dead ends, Ross uncovered her heartbreaking and inspiring origin story and began navigating the complicated turns of reuniting with her birth parents and their new families. Through backcountry travel in the American West, she also came to understand her place in the world, realizing that her true identity lay not in a choice between adopted or biological parents, but in an expansion of the concept of family
Indigo Moor is the Poet Laureate Emeritus of Sacramento. His just-published fourth book of poetry, Everybody’s Jonesin’ for Something, took second place in the University of Nebraska Press’ Backwater Prize. His second book, Through the Stonecutter’s Window, won Northwestern University Press’s Cave Canem prize. His first and third books, Tap-Root and In the Room of Thirsts & Hungers, were both part of Main Street Rag’s Editor’s Select Poetry Series. Moor is an adjunct professor at Dominican University and a visiting faculty member in Dominican’s MFA program, teaching poetry and short fiction. He is a former faculty member at the Stonecoast MFA Program, where he graduated in 2012 with an MFA in poetry, fiction, and scriptwriting.
Three of Indigo Moor’s short plays, Harvest, Shuffling, and The Red and Yellow Quartet debuted at the 60 Million Plus Theatre’s Spring Playwright’s festival. His full-length stageplay, Live! at the Excelsior, was a finalist for the Images Theatre Playwright Award, and the subsequent screenplay has been optioned for a full-length film. Find out why everybody’s jonesin’ for more Indigo Moor poetry at https://www.indigomoor.org.
The Poetry Night Reading Series, taking place on the first and third Thursdays of the month, is generously supported by the people and poets of the Sacramento Valley. Your host is Dr. Andy Jones, the poet laureate emeritus of the City of Davis. See Dr. Andy’s new (free) weekly newsletter at https://andyjones.substack.com – Please subscribe!
Please join us on Thursday, March 4th, at 8 PM via ZOOM!
Dr. Andy
Find the Facebook Event Page for this Reading Here:
https://www.facebook.com/events/234399385017711
P.S. Our March 18th Poetry Night event will feature prolific New York City poet Aaron Poochigian. His latest work, American Divine, won the 2020 Richard Wilbur Award. Poetry Night on April 1 will feature Davis’s own Julia Levine, winner of many prizes, author of the new book Ordinary Psalms. Other future readers include Katie Peterson (in May), and Hannah Stein (this fall).
