2010 Poetry Participants

Listed in alphabetical order

Simone Beaubien

Youth Poetry Slam - Saturday 2:30 PM

Simone Beaubien is a decade-plus-veteran of the New England slam poetry scene, six-time competitor at the National Poetry Slam, and SlamMaster of the world-famous Boston Poetry Slam at the Cantab Lounge. She's appeared as an MC from coast to coast, including the 2006 Individual World Poetry Slam Finals in Vancouver and the 2010 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational Finals in Boston, and she will serve as the Artistic Director for the 2011 National Poetry Slam in Cambridge. This is her fifth year hosting at the Newburport Literary Festival.

David Berman

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

David Berman, a noted attorney, is a graduate of the University of Florida. He earned graduate degrees at Johns Hopkins University and Boston University, where he studied with Robert Lowell. While attending Harvard Law School he frequently published work in the Harvard Advocate. Berman’s work has also appeared in numerous magazines, including Counter Measures, The Formalist, Harvard Magazine, Piedmont Literary Review, The Epigrammatist, Sparrow, Lambs & Trochees, and Orbis. He has also published three chapbooks: Future Imperfect (State Street Press, 1982), Slippage (Robert L. Barth, 1996), and David Berman: Greatest Hits 1965–2002 (Pudding House, 2002). His awards and honors include several from the World Order of Narrative and Formalist Poets, which sponsors a yearly national competition. A 25 year resident of Belmont, Berman is fortunate enough to have many interests in life including food, wine, history, the Bible, and music.

Bob Brodsky

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Bob Brodsky comes to polyphonic reading from the visual arts, where all things can become metaphor. His daily work is devoted to bringing forward the gestures found in amateur movie film to inform and delight future generations. He celebrates his good fortune to live among the talented craftsmen of the Merrimack, the Newburyport Choral Society, and the Powow River Poets. Photo by Aukram Burton.

Michael Cantor

Coffee with the Poets - Saturday 8:30 AM

Michael Cantor's poetry has appeared in Measure, Margie, The Atlanta Review, The Dark Horse, The Comstock Review (Pushcart nomination), 14 by 14, and many other journals, anthologies and e-zines. He has won the New England Poetry Club Erika Mumford (2006) and Gretchen Warren (2008) Awards, and was a finalist or semi-finalist for the Nemerov, Richard Wilbur, Donald Justice, and Morton Marr Prizes. A chapbook, The Performer, was published by Pudding House Press in 2007. A native New Yorker, he has lived and worked in Japan, Latin America and Europe; and presently resides on nearby Plum Island with his wife, her cat, and a great many books, woks and condiments.

David Davis

Coffee with the Poets - Saturday 8:30 AM

David Davis is a Newbury resident and a five-year member of the Powow River Poets. He began writing poetry in Colorado in the 1960s as a member of a group that performed poems on the streets of Denver, earning enough for a spaghetti dinner on a good day. His poems frequently reflect his experience as a surveyor, rock climber, birder, math teacher, philosophy professor, and artificial intelligence researcher. Davis has edited or written four books in the area of evolutionary computation. In one of his presentations in 2008 he described new techniques for assessing and managing risk to the risk management division of a major international bank. The talk was well received, but came a year too late.

Rhina P. Espaillat

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Rhina P. Espaillat, Dominican-born and bilingual, has published poetry, essays and short stories in both English and her native Spanish, as well as translations. She has been the recipient of the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry, the Richard Wilbur Award, The Nemerov Prize, the Oberon First Prize, and several awards from the Poetry Society of America, the New England Poetry Club, the Robert Frost Foundation and the Dominican Republic's Ministry of Culture and Education. Her work has appeared in numerous magazines, including The Formalist, Measure, Poetry, Review: Literature & Arts of the Americas, and The Hudson Review, as well as in some fifty anthologies and many websites. The most recent of her eleven collections are Playing at Stillness and Her Place in These Designs.

Midge Goldberg

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Midge Goldberg lives in Derry, NH. Her poems have appeared in Measure, First Things, Dogwood, Alehouse 2008, Cadenza, Rhyming Poems, and other publications. She was a finalist for the 2008 Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award. Her first book of poetry, Flume Ride, was published in 2006 by David Robert Books. She has an MFA from the University of New Hampshire, is a member of the Powow River Poets, and is a founding member of the Hyla Brook Poets.

Don Kimball

Coffee with the Poets - Saturday 8:30 AM

Don Kimball is the author of two chapbooks, Journal of a Flatlander (Finishing Line Press 2009) and Skipping Stones (Pudding House Publications 2008). His poetry has appeared in The Formalist, The Lyric, The Blue Unicorn, and various other journals and anthologies. In 2007, he was nominated for a Pushcart Prize; in 2009, he was nominated for the Pen New England Literary Award; and he has won two first prizes and a second prize in national contests sponsored by the Poetry Society of New Hampshire. Don currently hosts the monthly poetry reading series at Gibson’s Bookstore in Concord, NH.

Len Krisak

Coffee with the Poets - Saturday 8:30 AM

Len Krisak has taught at Brandeis, Northeastern University, and Stonehill College. His two chapbooks, Midland and Fugitive Child, came out in 1999 from Somers Rocks Press and Aralia Press, respectively. In 2000, his full-length collection Even as We Speak won the Richard Wilbur Prize and was published by the University of Evansville Press. In 2004, If Anything appeared from WordTech Editions, in 2006, Carcanet published his Odes of Horace, a complete translation, and in 2010 his complete translation of Virgil’s Eclogues was published by the University of Pennsylvania Press. In addition to the Richard Wilbur Prize, he has received the Robert Penn Warren and Robert Frost Prizes, the Pinch Prize, a Los Angeles Poetry Festival Award, and numerous honors from the New England Poetry Club, which awarded Even as We Speak the Motton Book Prize. He is the former winner of the GoldPocket.com National Trivia Competition and is a four-time Champion on Jeopardy!

Wesley McNair

Wesley McNair - Saturday 2:30 PM

The recipient of numerous awards in poetry, Wesley McNair has held grants from the Guggenheim and Fulbright foundations, two Rockefeller fellowships, and two grants in creative writing from the National Endowment for the Arts. He recently read his poems at the Library of Congress and was selected for a United States Artists Fellowship as one of “America’s finest living artists.” McNair’s latest book is the newly released volume Lovers of the Lost, New & Selected Poems. Photo by Dan Habib

Robert Moore

Coffee with the Poets - Saturday 8:30 AM

Robert Moore has been writing poetry since the early 1990’s. He self-published a collection of poems in 1997, A Bridge with a View, Little Rabbit Press. He’s editor of a literary journal called The Lit Fuse, a collection of poems, stories, and artwork for the First Unitarian Universalist Society of Exeter, Exeter, NH. He’s had poems published in several literary journals including The Lyric, Compass Rose, The Poet’s Touchstone, and The 2008 Poet’s Guide to New Hampshire. In December of 2009, he released a second collection of poems entitled Unexpected Colors, Beech River Books. In addition to writing poetry, Moore is a composer of songs and guitar instrumentals and performs as a guitarist and singer for the acoustic-driven group Sylvan Roots. He’s a current member of the Seacoast Writers Association, The Hyla Brook Poets, The Poetry Society of New Hampshire, and the Powow River Poets. Since 1999, his day job is as a science teacher at Pelham High School, Pelham, NH.

Anne Mulvey

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

A resident of Newburyport and Professor Emerita at UMass Lowell, Anne Mulvey is a long-time member of the Powow River Poets. Anne has had poems published in Abafazi, The Bridge Review, The Community Psychologist and in community newspapers and grassroots publications.

Alfred Nicol

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Alfred Nicol is the author of Winter Light, recipient of the 2004 Richard Wilbur Award. A member of the Powow River Poets, he was editor of The Powow River Anthology, published in 2006. His poetry has appeared in Contemporary Poetry of New England and in numerous journals, including Poetry, Commonweal, The Formalist, New England Review, The Dark Horse and Cimarron Review. His new book, Elegy for Everyone, received The Anita Dorn Memorial Prize and will be published in 2010.

J.D. Scrimgeour

Closing Ceremony Honoring The Writer’s Life - Saturday 7:00 PM

J.D. Scrimgeour has published a collection of poetry, The Last Miles (2005) and two books of creative nonfiction, Spin Moves (2000) and Themes For English B: A Professor’s Education In and Out of Class (2006), which won the AWP Award for Creative Nonfiction. His poetry has appeared in magazines such as Poetry, Ploughshares, Colorado Review, River Styx, Tar River Poetry, Connecticut Review, and Diner, and it has won awards from the National Society of Arts and Letters and the Academy of American Poets. In 2008 named a finalist for a Massachusetts Cultural Council Individual Artist grant in poetry. Scrimgeour’s nonfiction has appeared in such publications as The Boston Globe Magazine, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Creative Nonfiction, Thought & Action, and Organica. He has served as Coordinator of Creative Writing at Salem State College for several years.

Philip Swanson

Closing Ceremony Honoring The Writer’s Life - Saturday 7:00 PM

Philip Swanson has had a distinguished career as a trombonist, pianist, organist, composer, conductor, and teacher. He received a Doctor of Musical Arts from New England Conservatory, Master of Music from the Eastman School, and completed his undergraduate work at Oberlin Conservatory and the University of Miami. Swanson is an Assistant Professor of Music at Salem State College, where he teaches music theory, composition, piano, and trombone. Since 1991, he has been Music Director of the First Congregational Church of Rockport, Massachusetts, where he serves as organist, choir director, and administrator of the Old Sloop Concert Series. Swanson has written and published numerous works for various instrumental and vocal ensembles. He can also be heard on a wide range of recordings, including a solo piano album of original works, several small group jazz albums, and performances with larger ensembles, including John Williams and the Boston Pops. For more information on his recordings, visit MSR Classics.

Elizabeth Thomas

Elizabeth Thomas - Saturday 10:00 AM

Elizabeth Thomas is a published poet, performer, advocate of the arts and educator. The author of three books of poetry, she has read her work throughout the US and this past February presented ‘Poetry as Theater’ in the United Arab Emirates. Much of her energy and time is devoted to designing and teaching writing programs to promote literacy and the power of written and spoken word. As an outstanding advocate of youth in the arts, Elizabeth Thomas is a coach and organizer with Brave New Voices: International Youth Poetry Slam and Festival. She believes poetry is meant to be heard out loud and in person. More at www.upwordspoetry.com

Toni Treadway

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Toni Treadway joined the Powow River Poets in 2004, drawn to their excellent public readings. She tried open mic, is learning about formal poetry in workshops, and helps organize the Polyphony. Toni works with old movie film and sings in the Newburyport Choral Society. Photo by Aukram Burton.

Deborah Warren

Polyphony: Poets Read New England - Saturday 5:00 PM

Deborah Warren is the author of two poetry collections: The Size of Happiness (2003, Waywiser Press, London) and Zero Meridian (2004, Ivan R. Dee), which received the fourth annual New Criterion Poetry Prize. Her poems have appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Poetry, and The Yale Review.

Afaa Michael Weaver

Afaa Weaver - Saturday 11:30 AM

Afaa Michael Weaver's tenth collection of poetry is The Plum Flower Dance (U Pittsburgh 2007). Also a playwright, he has won the PDI Award from ETA Theater in Chicago as well as an NEA fellowship in poetry and a PEW fellowship in poetry. Weaver translates contemporary Chinese poetry and is a student of Chinese language and culture. At Simmons he holds an endowed chair and has received the May Sarton Award and a Pushcart prize (2008) for poetry.

Richard Wilbur

Richard Wilbur - Saturday 1:00 PM

Richard Wilbur's first book of poems, The Beautiful Changes and Other Poems was published in 1947. Since then, he has published several books of poems, including Collected Poems, 1943-2004; Mayflies: New Poems and Translations; New and Collected Poems (1988), which won the Pulitzer Prize; The Mind-Reader: New Poems; Walking to Sleep: New Poems and Translations; Advice to a Prophet and Other Poems; Things of This World, for which he received the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award; and Ceremony and Other Poems. About Wilbur's poems, one reviewer for The Washington Post said, "Throughout his career Wilbur has shown, within the compass of his classicism, enviable variety. His poems describe fountains and fire trucks, grasshoppers and toads, European cities and country pleasures. All of them are easy to read, while being suffused with an astonishing verbal music and a compacted thoughtfulness that invite sustained reflection."

Among his honors are the Wallace Stevens Award, the Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry, the Frost Medal, the Gold Medal for Poetry from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, two Bollingen Prizes, the T. S. Eliot Award, a Ford Foundation Award, two Guggenheim Fellowships, the Edna St. Vincent Millay Memorial Award, the Harriet Monroe Poetry Award, the National Arts Club medal of honor for literature, two PEN translation awards, the Prix de Rome Fellowship, and the Shelley Memorial Award. He was elected a chevalier of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques and is a former Poet Laureate of the United States.

A Chancellor Emeritus of The Academy of American Poets, Wilbur lives in Cummington, Massachusetts.