Browse Reading by Year

Saretta Morgan reads extensively from Alt-Nature (2024), her first full-length collection. Rooted in southern Arizona, her poems consider the militarization of the US-Mexico border and the legacies of colonialism in American culture.

O'odham poets Ofelia Zepeda, Su:k Chu:vak Fulwilder, and Amber Lee Ortega read poems in English and O'odham from the exhibition The Place Where Clouds Are Formed (April 4-August 31, 2024). Their poems and commentary focus on O'odham identity, experiences including displacement and violence, the importance of honoring the desert, and the resilience of individuals and communities. Traditional religion and Catholicism are discussed throughout.  

In this trilingual event, Zapotec-language poet Natalia Toledo and translator Clare Sullivan read from Toledo's The Black Flower and Other Zapotec Poems (2015) and a forthcoming collection titled Deche bitoope / El dorso del cangrejo / Carapace Dancer. All poems are read in Zapotec (Toledo's originals), Spanish (translated by Toledo) and English (translated from the Spanish by Sullivan). Toledo reads from Mexico City via Zoom.

Gabriel Dozal reads from his first book, The Border Simulator (2023), which considers the US-Mexico border with humor through the voices of several characters. Dozal also reads poems from what he describes as a B-side to the book—related poems that don't appear in the published version. This reading was originally given alongside Maddie Norris, Gabriel Palacios, and Margo Steines, all fellow alumni of the University of Arizona creative writing MFA program.

Maddie Norris reads from The Wet Wound: An Elegy in Essays (2024), focused on grief and loss of her father. She reads an essay from the book written in the second person and addressed to her childhood. This reading was originally given alongside Gabriel Dozal, Gabriel Palacios, and Margo Steines, all fellow alumni of the University of Arizona creative writing MFA program.

Gabriel Palacios reads from his first book, A Ten Peso Burial for Which Truth I Sign (2024). The poems touch on themes of family history and identity, and Tucson appears throughout. This reading was originally given alongside Gabriel Dozal, Maddie Norris, and Margo Steines, all fellow alumni of the University of Arizona creative writing MFA program.

Margo Steines reads from her memoir Brutalities: A Love Story (2023), sharing a chapter focused on running, obsession, and the way pain can shape us. This reading was originally given alongside Gabriel Dozal, Maddie Norris, and Gabriel Palacios, all fellow alumni of the University of Arizona creative writing MFA program.

At this special event for middle school students, Celia C. Pérez talks about zines and her experiences as a writer. She reads briefly from her first book, The First Rule of Punk (2017). She then leads a hands-on workshop in which the students look at a selection of zines and create their own.

Dana Levin reads from her fifth book, Now Do You Know Where You Are (2022), sharing poems written during a time of anxiety about the future that engage with the body, philosophy, grief, and healing. She closes by reading "House of Feels," an essay from her memoir in progress about becoming a poet.

In this bilingual reading, Brenda Lozano reads from her novel Brujas (2020) in the original Spanish, as well as from Witches (2022), the English translation by Heather Cleary. The novel reflects on women, power, and language, centering on a shaman or bruja from an indigenous community in Mexico. Manuel Muñoz reads a portion of the English translation.

Mark Wunderlich opens by reading from his fourth collection, God of Nothingness (2021), before turning to recently written poems. He shares work that centers on the body, animals, violence, and the complex inheritances arising from lineage and place.

CAConrad reads from Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return (2024), an ecopoetic work considering animal and human realities in the Anthropocene. To open, CAConrad briefly discusses and reads from Amanda Paradise: Resurrect Extinct Vibration (2021); to close, they read one poem from the chapbook First Light (2024). This reading was presented in connection with CAConrad's exhibit 500 Places at Once on display at MOCA Tucson.

Mary Ruefle reads from The Book (2023), together with new poems and what she terms "scraps"—found poems or brief fragments of writing. She primarily selects short pieces but also reads from "Dear Friends," an essay on friendship. Humor and reflections on the passage of time recur throughout.

Brandon Som reads from his Pulitzer Prize-winning collection Tripas (2023), sharing poems focused on his Mexican American and Chinese American grandparents, particularly their experiences living and working in Phoenix, Arizona. Throughout the poems, images of circuitry and electronics link the poems back to his Chicana grandmother's work in a Motorola factory.

Peruvian poet Tilsa Otta and translator Farid Matuk read from The Hormone of Darkness: A Playlist (2024) in both the original Spanish and the English translations. Otta shares poems that reflect on the self in relationship to lovers, the universe, and contemporary music including reggaeton and pop.

Roger Reeves reads poems from his second book, Best Barbarian (2022), together with a prose excerpt from Dark Days: Fugitive Essays (2023) and new poems. Reeves' work in this reading highlights the violence inherent in the United States—both as an idea and as a reality. His poems and prose frequently include allusions to canonical and contemporary literature, American history and politics, and hip hop.

Hala Alyan opens with excerpts from her 2024 essay "'I am not there and I am not here': a Palestinian American poet on bearing witness to atrocity." She then reads from her poetry collection The Moon That Turns You Back (2024) alongside recent, uncollected poems.

U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón reads poems that center on the natural world, resilience, women's strength, and the interconnection of all living things. She reads from her books Lucky Wreck (2006), Sharks in the Rivers (2010), Bright Dead Things (2015), The Carrying (2018), and The Hurting Kind (2022). Limón closes with two poems written during her laureateship, commissioned by the National Climate Assessment and NASA.

Ilya Kaminsky reads from Deaf Republic (2019), a parable in poems that considers violence, complicity, resistance, community, and intimacy. Set in a fictional town under occupation, the narrative opens with the murder of a young boy by a soldier. Kaminsky reads primarily from the book's first act, which follows a pregnant woman and her husband as the soldiers' violence against the town escalates. This reading was originally given with Katie Farris.

Katie Farris reads poems from Standing in the Forest of Being Alive (2023), which follows her experiences with breast cancer, chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation. Through these poems, Farris explores love, intimacy, and daily life during illness with humor and compassion. She opens with one new poem and a translation of Ukrainian poet Lesyk Panasiuk. This reading was originally given with Ilya Kaminsky.

Kimberly Blaeser reads from Ancient Light (2024), her sixth poetry collection, which reflects on the effects of colonization and searches for ways that all people can survive, heal, and thrive. Blaeser closes with several poems from an earlier collection, Copper Yearning (2019), as well as one uncollected poem. Throughout, major themes include water, kinship, witnessing to loss, and solidarity in community.

Terrances Hayes reads new, uncollected poems together with poems from his most recent books: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin (2018), Watch Your Language: Visual and Literary Reflections on a Century of American Poetry (2023), and So to Speak (2023). Several poems center on writers who have influenced Hayes' work, and the American sonnet form recurs throughout the reading.

Niki Herd reads new, uncollected poems together with sections of The Stuff of Hollywood (2024), her book-length documentary poem on American violence. Throughout, her poems incorporate found texts as they address racism, violence against Black Americans, the January 6 insurrection, increasing isolation, and questions of complicity.

Divya Victor reads poems from Curb (2021), her book focused on the experiences of South Asian immigrants in the United States and the violence routinely directed against them in public spaces. Those public spaces include suburban neighborhoods and the documents of the U.S. immigration system. Victor closes with a new poem that celebrates girlhood.

This launch event for the anthology Like a Hammer: Poets on Mass Incarceration (2025) includes readings by three poets from the book, following an introduction to the project by editor Diana Marie Delgado. Sin à Tes Souhaits reads poems focused on mass incarceration and the cycles of violence it perpetuates. Roque Raquel Salas Rivera reads poems in Spanish and English about el Oso Blanco, a prison built with the labor of enslaved people and prisoners in Puerto Rico. Vanessa Angélica Villarreal reads an essay on Game of Thrones viewed as a story of Latine identity in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. A series of short poem-films shown at the event is not included for reasons of copyright.

Alison Hawthorne Deming reads poems focused on animals, humans' relationship with the natural world, and the political landscape of post-2016 America. These poems come from The Gift of Animals: Poems of Love, Loss, and Connection (2025), edited by Deming, and her sixth collection of poetry, Blue Flax & Yellow Mustard Flower (2025). This reading was originally given with Sally Ball.

Sally Ball reads uncollected poems that reflect on time's passage, her sister, human impacts on the environment, and the way technology mediates our interactions with the world. Two poems stem from a visit to an observatory in Chile's Atacama Desert. This reading was originally given with Alison Hawthorne Deming.

Robert Pinsky reads poems published across thirty-five years, many of which engage with poetic and cultural ancestors. He opens with work collected in his Selected Poems (2011) before reading from his newest collection, Proverbs of Limbo (2024). Pinsky also reads two new poems that appeared in magazines around the time of this reading.

Natasha Wimmer reads her translations from the Spanish of Salvadoran poet Roque Dalton, Mexican novelist Álvaro Enrigue, and Chilean novelist Roberto Bolaño. She opens with a translation-in-progress of Dalton's poems written in 1970s Cuba before turning to Enrigue's You Dreamed of Empires (2024), a novel about the Spanish conquistadors' stay in Tenochtitlan in 1519. She closes with an excerpt from Roberto Bolaño's novel The Savage Detectives (2007), which follows fictional young poets in Mexico City.

Jennifer Chang reads from her third collection, An Authentic Life (2024), which pushes back against fathers and father-figures as it considers new sources of knowledge for making sense of life. She also reads briefly from her first two books, The History of Anonymity (2008) and Some Say the Lark (2017), and she closes with a new, unpublished poem.

Thomas Dai reads an essay from his first book, Take My Name But Say It Slow (2025). The essay considers the beginning of a romantic relationship alongside lovers' marks—initials or other signs left in public as declarations of love. This reading was originally given alongside Josh Riedel.

Josh Riedel reads the opening chapter of a novel-in-progress. Set in a small community, the chapter follows a writer working on a book about dark sky preservation while he and his partner also try to have a child. This reading was originally given alongside Thomas Dai.

Mathias Svalina reads from his eighth book, Thank You, Terror (2024). He also reads "dreams," surrealist prose poems written across the past eleven years of his Dream Delivery Service, through which Svalina delivers dreams by bike to subscribers. This reading was originally given alongside Richard Siken.

Richard Siken reads from I Do Know Some Things (2025), his third book, selecting prose poems focused on his stroke and the early days following it. This reading was originally given alongside Mathias Svalina.

Tracy K. Smith reads from her essay collection Fear Less: Poetry in Perilous Times (2025), alternating between the book's prose and recent poems. These recent poems come from Such Color: New and Selected Poems (2021) and from an unpublished manuscript titled The Forest. Smith describes poetry as an intervention amidst the rise of de-humanizing values and as a response that invites us to recognize the humanity in one another.

Farid Matuk reads poems from his collection Moon Mirrored Indivisible (2025), considering themes of masculinity, state violence, and racism. He closes with a poem by Susan Briante, with whom this reading was originally given.

Susan Briante reads from 13 Questions for the Next Economy: New and Selected Works (2025). She primarily reads new poems from the collection that consider themes of anti-capitalism, revolution, and family. Collages included in the book are shown throughout. Briante opens with a poem by Farid Matuk, with whom this reading was originally given.

Matthew Olzmann reads new, uncollected work after opening with two poems from his third collection, Constellation Route (2022). Throughout, his poems utilize humor and absurdity as they examine human connection and contemporary life. This reading was originally given alongside Vievee Francis.

Vievee Francis reads from The Shared World (2023) and Forest Primeval (2016), along with one uncollected poem. The poems she reads consider the griefs and joys of close relationships amidst the strains of our present world. This reading was originally given alongside Matthew Olzmann.