Open Mic following the Featured Readers — feel free to share one poem, one page.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Laura Costas Laura Costas is an artist, writer, musician and DC native. Ariadne Awakens (Paycock Press) is her third book of short works.
Sage Yamashita Sage Yamashita graduated with a BA from Albright college that has nothing to do with poetry and works a day job that also has nothing to do with poetry so of course he spends most of his free time reading and writing poetry. He has been published in wingless dreamer Soulful Verses collection as well as The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature.
Open Mic following the Featured Readers — feel free to share one poem, one page.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Alison Palmer is the author of the full-length poetry collection, Bargaining with the Fall (Broadstone Books, January 2023), the poetry chapbook, Everything Is Normal Here (Broadstone Books, 2022), and the poetry chapbook, The Need for Hiding, (Dancing Girl Press, 2018). Among numerous distinctions, Alison is the recipient of a 2022 Independent Artist Award (IAA) grant by the Maryland State Arts Council (MSAC). She received her MFA from Washington University in St. Louis, and she was awarded the Emma Howell Memorial Poetry Prize from Oberlin College. You can find her on the web: www.alisonpalmer.org.
Joseph Ross is the author of five books of poetry: Crushed & Crowned (2023), Raising King (2020), Ache (2017), Gospel of Dust (2013) and Meeting Bone Man (2012). His poems appear in many publications including The New York Times Magazine, The Los Angeles Times, Xavier Review, Poet Lore, Fledgling Rag, The Langston Hughes Review, and the 2022 anthology, WHERE WE STAND: Poems of Black Resilience. He won the 2012 Pratt Library / Little Patuxent Review Prize for his poem “If Mamie Till Was the Mother of God.” He currently serves on the Poetry Board at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C. He teaches English to high school students and writes regularly at www.JosephRoss.net.
Indran Amirthanayagam is a poet, editor, publisher, translator, youtube host and diplomat. He writes in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese and Haitian Creole. He has published twenty four poetry books, including Isleño (R.I.L. Editores), Blue Window (Ventana Azul) (trans. Jennifer Rathbun) (Diálogos Books), Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (BroadstoneBooks.com), The Migrant States, Coconuts on Mars, The Elephants of Reckoning (winner 1994 Paterson Poetry Prize), Uncivil War and.The Splintered Face: Tsunami Poems. He edits the Beltway Poetry Quarterly (www.beltwaypoetry.com) and writes https://indranamirthanayagam.blogspot.com. Amirthanayagam hosts The Poetry Channel https://youtube.com/user/indranam. New books include Powèt nan po la (Poet of the Port ) MadHat Press, 2023) and Origami:Selected Poems of Manuel Ulacia (Diálogos Books, 2023)..
Let’s not stick to our poem plan of reading only originals in the Open next week, unless you’d like to. I welcome us to focus selections and energies on remembering and celebrating our much-loved, much-missed Poet friend, Reuben Jackson, whose words live on.
Open Mic following the Featured Readers — feel free to share one poem, one page.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Marlena Chertock is a lesbian, Jewish, disabled poet with two books of poetry, Crumb-sized: Poems (Unnamed Press) and On that one-way trip to Mars (Bottlecap Press). She uses her skeletal dysplasia as a bridge to scientific poetry. Her poetry and prose has appeared in AWP’s The Writer’s Notebook, Breath & Shadow, The Deaf Poets Society, Lambda Literary Review, Little Patuxent Review, Paper Darts, Paranoid Tree, Washington Independent Review of Books, WMN Zine, Wordgathering, and more. Find her at marlenachertock.com and @mchertock.
Philip Wexler has had over 210 of his poems published in literary magazines. His full-length poetry collections include The Sad Parade (prose poems), and The Burning Moustache, both published by Adelaide Books, The Lesser Light (Finishing Line Press), With Something Like Hope (Silver Bow Publishing) and I Would be the Purple (Kelsay Books). He also hosts Words out Loud, a hybrid in-person/remote monthly spoken word series in the Washington, DC area.
I missed paying the fee for the website domain long enough that there was a late fee, which was high enough for me to drag my heels on paying, until now. Our dear founder, Lucinda Marshall, did caution that the domain name would be picked up quick by someone else were it to lapse. She was correct.
Our January and February readings featured incredible poets with thoughtful and entertaining work! Courtney LeBlanc, Nathan Leslie, Barbara DeCesare, and Donald Illich all read beautifully! The readings were moderately attended. There was some contradiction in posted dates with the February reading, which will inspire us to have Barbara and Don back to read sooner rather than later, because I bet some fans missed them for the confusion!
We’ll start posting Facebook invites and this site will enjoy timely updates. Plenty of places to check in to not miss any of the powerful poetry hosted by DiVerse! And with that too, we’ll not wait for attendees, but start punctually, 7 o’clock, to hopefully save more time at the end for mingling with the authors and buying autographed collections without rushing the Open Mic.
I like being able to look back at the history of readers and events. In that spirit, I will repost our November-February readers.
Feel free to share this site and post our future readings to all of your socials. We have some great ones coming up! Stay tuned…
-Kristin
November ’23
Jenn Koiter is the 2021 winner of the DC Poet Project. She holds degrees from Northwestern University, the University of Chicago, and Antiock University, and was the recipient of the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship. Originally from Colorado Springs, Jenn lived in Los Angeles, New Delhi, Wyoming, Chicago, and Austin, prior to Washington, D.C.
Raised on a rice and catfish farm in eastern Arkansas, CL Bledsoe is the author of more than twenty-five books, including the poetry collections Riceland, Trashcans in Love, Grief Bacon, and his newest, The Bottle Episode, as well as his latest novels Goodbye, Mr. Lonely and The Saviors. Bledsoe co-writes the humor blog How to Even, with Michael Gushue. He’s been published in hundreds of journals, newspapers, and websites that you’ve probably never heard of. Bledsoe lives in northern Virginia with his daughter.
December ’23
Jacki Lewis (now DuPuy) is from Rockville, MD. She is the six of eight children. Her parents’ method of child rearing, a mixture of love, strictness, and compassion, heavily influenced her life. She always felt she had a creative side, but restricted it to hobbies. After a couple years of college, she eventually landed a job in HR at the International Monetary Fund. She slowly grew more confident in her creativity and got involved in various outlets: writing classes and clubs, open mic poetry, and urban line dancing, where she started an e-newsletter. She also had a short story published in Scribble magazine.
After a layoff, she completed her B.A., focused on her son, worked full and part-time jobs, got into belly dancing and got married. A health scare in 2021 inspired her to start an amateur artist showcase, where regular people can showcase their creative side. Through her part-time job with Casey, she heard about DiVerse, started writing again and became a regular participant.
Richard Peabody, born in Washington, DC., raised in Bethesda, MD., and now living in Arlington, VA., is a poet, writer, editor, teacher, publisher. The author of a novella and three short story collections, he taught graduate fiction writing at Johns Hopkins University for 15 years. His Gargoyle Magazine (founded 1976) released issue 76 in August 2022. The magazine has since moved online. His most recent poetry volume, Guinness on the Quay, was published in Ireland (Salmon Poetry, 2019). The Richard Peabody Reader, a career-encompassing collection, was released in 2015 by Alan Squire Publishing.
January ’24
Courtney LeBlanc is the author of the full-length collections Her Whole Bright Life; Exquisite Bloody, Beating Heart; and Beautiful & Full of Monsters.
She is the Arlington County Poet Laureate, a Virginia Center for Creative Arts fellow, and the founder and editor-in-chief of Riot in Your Throat,
an independent poetry press. She loves nail polish, tattoos, and a soy latte each morning. Find her online at www.courtneyleblanc.com.
Nathan Leslie won the 2019 Washington Writers’ Publishing House prize for fiction for his collection of short stories, Hurry Up and Relax. He is also the series editor for Best Small Fictions. Invisible Hand (2022) and A Fly in the Ointment (2023) are his latest collections. Nathan’s previous books of fiction include Three Men, Root and Shoot, Sibs, and The Tall Tale of Tommy Twice. He is also the author of a collection of poems, Night Sweat. Nathan is currently the founder and organizer of the Reston Reading Series in Reston, Virginia, and the publisher and editor of the online journal Maryland Literary Review. Previously he was series editor for Best of the Web and fiction editor for Pedestal Magazine. His fiction has been published in hundreds of literary magazines such as Shenandoah, North American Review, Boulevard, Hotel Amerika, and Cimarron Review. Nathan’s nonfiction has been published in The Washington Post, Kansas City Star, and Orlando Sentinel. Nathan lives in Northern Virginia.
February ‘ 24
Poetry and fiction by Barbara DeCesare have appeared in Grain, Poetry, Alaska Quarterly, and many other journals. Her work has been adapted for song and stage. She is a graduate of the Goddard MFA program, and the author of three poetry collections: Jigsweyesore (Anti-Man), Adrift (Seventh Wave), and Silent Type (Paper Kite Press)
Barbara lives in York, PA.
Donald Illich‘s work appears in such journals as the Iowa Review, LIT, Nimrod, Passages North, Rattle, Fourteen Hills, The Louisville Review, Cimmaron Review, Map Literary, Spork, Cream City Review, and Sixth Finch. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and received a scholarship from the Nebraska Summer Writers Conference. He won Honorable Mention in the Washington Prize book contest and was a “Discovery” / Boston Review 2008 Poetry Contest semi-finalist. Gold Wake Press named his full-length manuscript a finalist during their 2015 open reading. His work has been anthologized in A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry and City of the Big Shoulders: An Anthology of Chicago Poetry. He published a chapbook, Rocket Children, in 2012, and published another chapbook in 2016, The Art of Dissolving (Finishing Line Press). His full-length manuscript, Chance Bodies, was published in 2018 by The Word Works. His newest book, Rescue is Elsewhere, was released in 2023.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Pamela Murray Winters is a poet, essayist, and Facebook oversharer from Bowie, Maryland. Her first book, The Unbeckonable Bird (FutureCycle Press, 2018), will be followed by another full-length book, whose manuscript is being considered by many fine publishers. In the meantime, she’s working on several chapbooks and, apparently, unexpected essays. Her work has been published in Gargoyle,Gettysburg Review, Fledgling Rag, ASP Bulletin, Possum, and other journals and anthologies. She’s read in lots of wonderful venues, has an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and has received two Maryland State Arts Council Individual Artist Awards.
Rocky Jones has been producing poetry readings in Maryland since 2005. His publishing credits include Texture Magazine, Gargoyle Magazine, and the online poetry journal Truck. His poetry performances have been included at Wheaton Arts Parade; Spiral Staircase in Annapolis; and Artsfest at Annmarie Sculpture Garden in Solomons. His 16-page poetry book, My Demo, was self-published in 2017.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Michael Gushue is the co-founder of the heteronymic nanopress Poetry Mutual. His books are Pachinko Mouth (Plan B Press), Conrad (Silver Spoon Press), Gather Down Women (Pudding House Press), and, in collaboration with CL Bledsoe, I Never Promised You A Sea Monkey (Pretzelcoatl Press). He lives in the Brookland neighborhood of Washington, D.C. His most recent collection, Sympathy for the Monster, offers a spellbinding tapestry of words, infusing the cinematic realm with an ethereal quality that captivates.
Sandra Beasley is the author of Made to Explode, winner of the Housatonic Book Award; Count the Waves; I Was the Jukebox, winner of the Barnard Women Poets Prize; Theories of Falling, winner of the New Issues Poetry Prize; and Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life, a disability memoir. She also edited Vinegar and Char: Verse from the Southern Foodways Alliance. She lives in Washington, D.C.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Khalil was born in Brooklyn, New York, and his parents are from St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands. His dad enjoys reading & came across The Prophet written by Kahlil Gibran. His father decided to name him after Kahlil Gibran because he found his writings to be phenomenal. Khalil’s inspiration to write has been from his wife, family, and the world that surrounds us. Khalil is musically inclined & enjoys playing music with his family. His brother Desmond makes and plays his music & continues to challenge Khalil to excel at what he loves. If you would like to check out his music, please go to the following: Linktr.ee/dfoymusic. Writing poetry allows him to unlock the unseen magic in the world. He will write what he feels & feel what he writes. Khalil feels that a part of happiness is being able to help one another through the journey called life. His goal is to continue to write & inspire those with the desire to be inspired.
David Quintanilla has been a writer since childhood. He transitioned much of his focus from short stories & novels to poetry in late 2022. He has since done poetry readings at an Amateur Artist showcase and had his work published in the Montgomery College literary magazine: The Red Jacket. His breadth of experience in mental health issues, and his desire to derive strength and meaning from adversity, often appear at the forefront of his poetry. He spends his days working in special education (with a focus on Autism), writing, playing soccer & enjoying nature.
Casey Community Center, 1 mile north of Shady Grove Metro on 355
810 S Frederick Ave, Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Sarah Katz is the author of Country of Glass (Gallaudet University Press, May 2022). She holds an MFA in creative writing from American University. Her poems appear in Bear Review, District Lit, Hole in the Head Review, Redivider, RHINO, Right Hand Pointing, Rogue Agent, the So to Speak blog, The Shallow Ends, and Wordgathering, among others. Her essays and articles have appeared in The Atlantic, Business Insider, The Guardian, OZY, The Nation, The New York Times, The Rumpus, Scientific American, Slate, The Washington Post, and other publications. Sarah is Poetry Editor of The Deaf Poets Society, an online journal that features work by writers and artists with disabilities.
Marianne Szlyk lives in Rockville, MD and is a professor at Montgomery College. Her poems have also appeared in of/with, Bourgeon, Mad Swirl, Spectrum, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, The Sligo Journal, Verse-Virtual, Mike Maggio’s 30-for-30, Sheila-na-gig, One Art, MacQueen’s Quinterly, and two of Pure Slush’s anthologies (25 Miles from Here and Home). Her most recent chapbook is Why We Never Visited the Elms. It is available on Amazon with her other books (I Dream of Empathy, On the Other Side of the Window, and Poetry en Plein Air). She reads now and again on Zoom.
Regie Cabico (he/him) is the first Asian American and openly queer poet to win the Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. He is a pioneer of the genre, later winning three national titles. His book, A Rabbit In Search of A Rolex will be published by Day Eight. He is the producer and co-curator of Homo Stanzas with Casey Catherine Moore, and Capturing Fire Slam.
Ishanee Chanda (she/her) is a prose writer and poet from Dallas, Texas. She is the author or two books of poetry titled Oh, these walls, they crumble (2017) and The Overflow (2018). Additionally, she has been published in the Eckleburg Project, Stoked Words: A Queer Anthology, Z Publishing House’s Emerging Texas Writers, Flypaper Magazine, and Apricity Press. She has participated in the BlackBox Writer’s Residency Program and was a part of a spoken word poetry scene in College Station, Texas known as Mic Check Poetry. Chanda currently resides in Washington, DC where she works full-time in the field of humanitarian aid and refugee response. She enjoys eating her weight in Thai food, singing loudly (and badly) to Taylor Swift, and playing the ukulele just to make people smile.
Heidi Mordhorst (she/her) is the author of two collections of poetry for young readers as well as contributions to journals and anthologies for both adults and children. She taught in early childhood classrooms for 35 years and recently served on the NCTE Excellence in Poetry Award Committee. Heidi now coaches young writers at WHISPERshout Writing Workshop in Montgomery County, Maryland.
H.L. Sudler (he/him) is the author of six books, including Patriarch: My Extraordinary Journey from Man to Gentleman (Archer Publishing, 2012), CafeLiving’s Favorite Cocktails (with Keith Vient, 2019), Man to Gentleman: A Beginner’s Guide to Manhood (2015), his short story collection The Looking Glass: Tales of Light and Dark (2018), and his thriller novel series Summerville (2014) and Return to Summerville (2017). His novellas include Sandman (2021), Midnight (2021), and Night As We Know It (2021). His short story “The Way of All Flesh” was selected for the PATHS Humanitarian Writing Award. He has served as a magazine publisher, a newspaper editor, and a contributing writer to numerous anthologies and periodicals. He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and currently lives in Washington, DC.
Kim Roberts is the author of six books of poems, most recently Corona/Crown, a cross-disciplinary collaboration with photographer Robert Revere (forthcoming from WordTech Editions in November 2023). She is editor of the anthology By Broad Potomac’s Shore: Great Poems from the Early Days of our Nation’s Capital (University of Virginia Press, 2020), selected by the East Coast Centers for the Book for the 2021 Route 1 Reads program as the book that “best illuminates important aspects” of the culture of Washington, DC. For twenty years, she edited the literary journal Beltway Poetry Quarterly, and since 2010 she has co-curated the web exhibit, DC Writers’ Homes, with Dan Vera. Roberts is the author of the popular guidebook, A Literary Guide to Washington, DC: Walking in the Footsteps of American Writers from Francis Scott Key to Zora Neale Hurston (University of Virginia Press, 2018). In 2023, she was one named of five LGBTQ+ Poets-in-Residence at the Arts Club of Washington.
DiVerse Gaithersburg 