Happenings at City of Asylum/Pittsburgh: Free Poetry Reading on the Northside

City of Asylum/Pittsburgh presents Poetry on the Northside, a free poetry reading featuring Cave Canem poets Colleen J. McElroy, Carl Phillips, Claudia Rankine, and Sapphire. On June 24th, each poet will be performing their work for the public under a tent on Monterey Street. Register here to reserve your seat.

Cave Canem is a writer’s center with a focus on African-American poets and writers. “I am interested in seeing Cave Canem becoming more invested in Pittsburgh and have more events here. I want us to have a real bedrock here. And it’s happening!” said Toi Derricotte, founder of the organization.

The reading will be preceded by a free writer’s workshops, where each poet will bring their own voice and unique background to share their craft with local poets.

Colleen J. McElroy writes prose, creative non-fiction, and poetry, while teaching as a Professor Emeritus of English and creative writing at the University of Washington. She was the former Editor-in-chief of the Seattle Review from 1995-2006. Her most recent collection of poetry, Sleeping with the Moon, was published in 2007 making it her ninth collection of poems to be published.

Carl Phillips is the author of numerous books of poetry, most recently Quiver of Arrows: Selected Poems 1986-2006 and Riding Westward. His collection The Rest of Love won the Theodore Roethke Memorial Foundation Poetry Prize and the Thom Gunn Award for Gay Male Poetry, and was a finalist for the National Book Award.

Claudia Rankine is the author of four collections of poetry, Don’t Let Me Be Lonely, Nothing in Nature Is Private, The End of the Alphabet, and Plot. She is the co-editor of the American Women Poets in the 21st Century: Where Lyric Meets Language. She is also a professor of English writing at the University of Houston.

Sapphire is a writer and performance poet, whose 1996 novel Push was adapted into the film Precious. She was also a key player in the New York Slam Poetry movement and published a collection of poetry in 1987 titled Meditations on the Rainbow.

Read Brian’s bio.