Poetry READINGS and Events

The Poetry Center at PCCC offers readings as part of the Distinguished Poets Series. It also hosts readings with poets who have been finalists and winners of contests and awards sponsored by the Center, including The Paterson Poetry Prize and The Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards. There is an annual reading to celebrate the latest issue of the Paterson Literary Review and for occasional anthologies sponsored by the Center. Many of the readings and workshops offered at The Poetry Center are also featured on Maria Mazziotti Gillan's blog.

The Poetry Center will be holding both virtual readings and in-person events. The Zoom links for virtual events will take you to the live event and later to the archived recording.

Virtual readings begin at 2:30 PM ET unless otherwise noted below.

In-person readings begin at 1 PM in the Hamilton Club unless otherwise noted below. (directions to Hamilton Club)

Recent readings from the Poetry Center and archived videos from years past are now available on the Poetry Center at PCCC’s YouTube Channel.

Poetry workshops are conducted by most of the featured poets before their readings. For more information on how to register, see the Workshops page.

Kwame Dawes is the author of numerous books of poetry and other books of fiction, criticism, and essays. His most recent collection is Sturge Town (Peepal Tree Press, UK 2023). Dawes is a George W. Holmes University Professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner. He teaches in the Pacific MFA Program and is the Series Editor of the African Poetry Book Series, Director of the African Poetry Book Fund, and Artistic Director of the Calabash International Literary Festival. He is a Chancellor for the Academy of American Poets and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Dawes is the winner of the prestigious Windham/Campbell Award for Poetry and was a finalist for the 2022 Neustadt International Prize for Literature. In 2022, Dawes was awarded the Order of Distinction Commander class by the Government of Jamaica. He is the Poet Laureate of Jamaica (2024-2027).

Maya C. Popa is the author of two collections, Wound is the Origin of Wonder (W.W. Norton, 2022) named one of the Guardian’srecent best books of poetry, and American Faith (Sarabande, 2019), runner-up in the Kathryn A. Morton Prize judged by Ocean Vuong and winner of the North American Book Prize. Her poems and essays appear in The Atlantic, the Nation, Poetry, the Paris Review, the Times Literary Supplement and elsewhere. She holds a PhD on the role of wonder in poetry from Goldsmiths, University of London, where she was a recipient of the English department bursary for exceptional merit. She was previously a Clarendon Scholar at Oxford University, where she earned her MA, and is a Veterans Fellows at NYU, where she earned her MFA. Her newsletter, Poetry Today, is one of Substack’s best-selling featured publications. Since 2018, she has served as the Poetry Editor of Publishers Weekly and Director of Creative Writing at the Nightingale-Bamford School. She teaches advanced poetry at NYU.

THEME: POETRY READING
HOST: The Poetry Center at Passaic County Community College
FEATURES: Kwame Dawes & Maya C. Popa
PRICE: N/A
CONTACT: FB - The Poetry Center at Passaic County Community College / 973-684-6555 / mgillan@pccc.edu