Hello, everybody, welcome.
Can you hear me OK?
You can.
Great, nice to see everybody.
Thanks for coming out on a Thursday night
in Tucson, happy to have everyone here.
We have officially come to the end of our reading series
that brings visiting poets to Tucson for the year.
So good work, you've chosen the right place
to be on this night.
Give yourself a round of applause.
[APPLAUSE]
It's been a beautiful year, if you've
been able to see any of the other readings,
and we're thrilled to have this moment after what
the past three years have looked like,
and so we're really looking forward to what comes next.
There's a really exciting season that comes up
that starts in the fall, and there's
a lot of summer programs that you'll hear about soon
from the Poetry Center.
Our calendar's about to come in the mail,
and those events are up on the Poetry Center's website.
So there's lots to look forward to,
but we're really, really thrilled to have everybody here
in this moment and gratitude to you for being here
on a Thursday night.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I'm Tyler.
I work here as the director at The Poetry Center.
There are a couple of events that still are on the calendar,
and I want to make sure you know about them.
So one of the most exciting is that on May 6th-- this
is a Saturday that's coming up-- at noon,
here at The Poetry Center, will be the MFA graduation reading,
and we really hope that you'll come for that.
These are the graduating members of the MFA program
here at the University of Arizona.
They'll be reading from their theses and their projects.
It's going to be great.
It's always amazing.
There are poets and writers that we will hear from in the years
to come.
So this is your chance to catch them
before Tucson sends them potentially away,
and so come join us for that.
That's May 6th, Saturday, here at the Poetry Center.
And then on May 20th, we have our annual launch
of the Writing the Community, the anthology.
And so Writing the Community is poets in the schools program
that happens at the Poetry Center.
We work with about 30 Title I classrooms,
and we place teaching artists in those classrooms
for eight weeks at a time.
So they do a bunch of work with those students.
Each student who participates in that program
can publish one poem in an annual citywide anthology,
and May 20th is the launch of that.
And so that will be here at 9 o'clock
at the Poetry Center, which is pretty awesome.
Some of the readers are this tall, some are this tall,
and some are this tall, and it's a great way
to see their book and their work into the world.
They also-- and they're pretty excited to sign
their books for you.
It's a good day.
It's an energizing day, and that'll start at 9 o'clock
and go for the morning until we get through those poems
with those students.
So that's May 20th back here at The Poetry Center.
I mentioned the summer calendar, anticipate that.
That's coming very, very soon.
Books for the reading tonight are for sale,
and so Jennifer Elise Foerster is here
in Tucson, which is a great gift.
We are lucky she's returning to us, and we're grateful for that
and excited to have her back again soon.
Michael Wasson is going to be joining us
from the digital realm.
So he'll be on the screen behind us,
and we're really pleased to have him in that regard as well.
Another terrific poet.
Both of their books are for sale over on my right,
and so if you have any coins in your pocket,
that's the place to put them.
Buy those books, and Jennifer especially,
would be happy to sign them afterwards from the reading.
Michael's going to read first, and Jennifer will read second.
I'm really excited to-- this is a partnership.
So tonight is a presentation from the Distinguished Visiting
Writers Series from the MFA program,
the creative writing program here
at the University of Arizona.
So these are our colleagues that teach creative writing
here at the university.
Tonight's event has been organized by our colleague
and friend Bojan Louis, who teaches in the creative writing
program and has a joint appointment also
in the American Indian Studies program.
He's amazing, and we're grateful.
His most recent book is a collection
of stories called "Sinking Bell."
It is also worth the coins in your pocket,
but buy these books first and that one second.
I want to welcome up Bojan to come tell us about the readers.
Bojan, come on up.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]