Storming The Bastille! A Poetry Reading By Phil Metres And Sean Thomas Dougherty

Come to Guide to Kulchur to hear Cleveland's Phil Metres read from his new book of poems SAND OPERA and Sean Thomas Dougherty reading from his book ALL YOU ASK FOR IS LONGING. Both books will be available for sale and signing at the reading. There will be a bit of circus too, cool hats, quotes from Kropotkin. And other subversive texts, activivities and dialogue. And poems, lots of wall bending poems. And anyone who buys a book gets a big hug which is priceless. An OPEN READING run by MC Lemonhead will follow the feature. Poets are invited to come read ONE poem. Signup will occur before the feature. PHIL METRES BIOGRAPHY Born in San Diego on July 4th, 1970, Philip Metres grew up in the suburbs of Chicago. He graduated from Holy Cross College in 1992, and spent the following year in Russia on a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, pursuing an independent project called “Contemporary Russian Poetry and Its Relationship to Historical Change.” Since receiving a Ph.D. in English and an M.F.A. in creative writing from Indiana University in 2001, Metres has written and translated a number of books and chapbooks, includingSand Opera (2015), I Burned at the Feast: Selected Poems of Arseny Tarkovsky (2014), Compleat Catalogue of Comedic Novelties (2014), Concordance of Leaves (2013), abu ghraib arias (2011), Ode to Oil(2011), To See the Earth (2008), Behind the Lines: War Resistance Poetry on the American Homefront since 1941 (2007), Instants (2006), Primer for Non-Native Speakers (2004), Catalogue of Comedic Novelties: Selected Poems of Lev Rubinstein(2004), and A Kindred Orphanhood: Selected Poems of Sergey Gandlevsky (2003). His writing has appeared widely, including in Best American Poetry and has garnered two NEA fellowships, two Arab American Book Awards, the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, five Ohio Arts Council Grants, the PEN/Heim Translation Grant, the Beatrice Hawley Award, the Anne Halley Prize, the Creative Workforce Fellowship, and the Cleveland Arts Prize. His work has been called “beautiful, powerful, magnetically original” (Cleveland Arts Prize citation). Lawrence Joseph has written that “Philip Metres’s poetry speaks to us all, in ways critical, vital, profound, and brilliant.” His poems have been translated into Arabic, Polish, Russian, and Tamil. He is a professor of English at John Carroll University in Cleveland, where he teaches American Literature and Creative Writing, and lives with his wife Amy and two daughters. SEAN THOMAS DOUGHERTY BIOGRAPHY Sean Thomas Dougherty grew up in an interracial politically radical family. A former resident of Cleveland, he is the author or editor of thirteen books including All You Ask for Is Longing: Poems 1994- 2014 (2014 BOA Editions) Scything Grace (2013 Etruscan Press) Sasha Sings the Laundry on the Line (2010 BOA Editions) and the novel The Blue City (2008 Marick Press/Wayne State University). He is the recipient of two Pennsylvania Council for the Arts Fellowships in Poetry, an appearance in Best American Poetry 2014, and a US Fulbright Lectureship to the Balkans. Known for his electrifying performances he has performed at hundreds of venues across North America and Europe including the Lollapalooza Music Festival, South Carolina Literary Festival, the Old Dominion Literary Festival, the Dodge Poetry Festival, the Bardfest Series in Budapest Hungary, and across Albania and Macedonia where he appeared on national television. He has taught creative writing at Syracuse University, Penn State University, Case Western University, Chatham University and Cleveland State University and was the 2014 Twin Cities Colllege Association Poet in Residence at Augsburg College. His work has been read on PBS radio in Pittsburgh PA, Rochester and Buffalo NY, and Cleveland OH. Among his many jobs he has worked as a college lecturer, a teacher, a truck loader, a factory packer, a warehouse man, a sod layer, and currently works at a pool hall in Erie, PA and tours for performances.