Woodstock Poetry Society
Featured Reading and Open Mike
Saturday, June 10th, 2023 at 2pm
Woodstock Library

HYBRID: in-person and virtually via Zoom

Irene Sipos
Perry S. Nicholas

Poets Irene Sipos and Perry S. Nicholas will be the featured readers, along with an open mike when the Woodstock Poetry Society meets in person and via Zoom (and streamed live on Facebook: www.facebook.com/WoodstockPoetry) on Saturday, June 10th, 2023 at 2pm(eastern).

WPS meetings are held the 2nd Saturday (2pm) of every month.

Woodstock Library
5 Library Lane, Woodstock, NY 12498
(845) 679-2213
www.woodstock.org

*** We ask all people who wish to attend in person to self-test for Covid within 24 hours prior to the event. Self-test kits are reasonably priced and available at nearly every pharmacy. ***

The Zoom app can be downloaded here: Zoom Download Center

To attend virtually: contact phillip@woodstockpoetry.com to receive Zoom info
If attending, please indicate if you would like to be on the open mike. Thank you.

The reading will be hosted by poet Phillip X Levine. All meetings are free, open to the public, and include an open mike.

Features:

Irene Sipos - Irene Sipos earned her MA in the legendary 1970s English Department of SUNY University at Buffalo. She taught in the Writing Program at Buffalo State University for thirty years where she was a founder of the Rooftop Poetry Club. Her work has appeared in scores of national and local publications and anthologies including Lilith Magazine, Earth's Daughters and The Comstock Review where she was a finalist in the Jesse Bryce Niles Chapbook contest in 2015. Her poem “Poetry” was recently selected for a public poetry project, Lit City on the Move by Just Buffalo Literary Center. She is the author of a collection of poems, Stones, published by No Frills Press. Irene lives in Buffalo New York where she is a coordinator of the Buffalo Corner Reading Series.



Tired

Sitting across the aisle
on the B train
I look at the row of weary faces

various shapes, sizes, colors, ages,
a horizontal explication of what it means
to have woken many mornings

to brave routine, to leave concerns at home
along with scattered laundry and unwashed
dishes to head for same/same at work.

I picture each of you, one at a time. I try to
observe without you knowing and suddenly I
see round, soft faces, no creases in foreheads,

no wrinkles like parentheses around eyes, no down
turned mouths, no slumped shoulders. I see the plump
babies you once were. And with that, a rush of hoping

that you were affectionately held on generous laps, that
you were sung tender songs, that you were offered
a bowl of blueberries as initiation to the messy pleasures

of this world. I hope that occasionally you reach back,
even if only briefly to recall your beginning self as a
visitor new to the planet, unencumbered and dear.

-Irene Sipos

*

Perry S. Nicholas - Perry S. Nicholas is a retired English Professor at SUNY at ERIE in Buffalo, N.Y. where he was awarded the SUNY Chancellor’s Award and the President’s Outstanding Teacher Award. He has published one textbook of poetry prompts, three full-length and six chapbooks of original poetry, along with two CDs of poetry. He has hosted 5 poetry venues over the years in the WNY area, and he has read his work in Woodstock, Kingston, Albany, NYC, Plymouth MA, and Athens, Greece. He has done interviews online with Stockbridge, MA library and Queens College, NYC. You can see his work at perrynicholas.com.



Seventy and Counting
    Our lives are defined by opportunities; even the ones we miss—Benjamin Button

Maybe like Benjamin Button I will age
backward, a being growing younger as he
moves ahead in his life, inch by inch.

I walk toward a mother’s voice calling me
home for dinner after riding a bike,
father’s bark when I pushed him too far.

In this fog, I wander, following
their ghostly voices in the night,
knowing in my right mind they are gone.

In my left, wishing for one more miracle,
but miracles happen only to mortals
who don’t play by the rules, discern too much,

believe in both taken and missed opportunities.
Maybe like Benjamin I will age, as I crawl closer
to the beginning, stop gracefully when I reach the start.

-Perry S. Nicholas

*

Developing WPS 2023 Schedule - February-December readings Hybrid: in-person and now at the Woodstock Library and via Zoom (and streamed live on Facebook: www.facebook.com/WoodstockPoetry)
All WPS Events: Events

01/January 14th - Danielle Woerner; Virginia Konchan (via Zoom only)
02/February 11th - Alison Koffler; Dayl Wise
03/March 11th - Allison Argueta; Brianna Heller
04/April 8th - Darcy Smith; Dennis Wayne Bressack
05/May 13th - Jerrice J. Baptiste; Mary K O'Melveny
06/June 10th - Irene Sipos; Perry S. Nicholas
07/July 8th - Kateri Kosek; Raphael Kosek
08/August 12th - David Messineo; Will Nixon
09/September 9th - Barbara Ungar; Lucia Cherciu
10/October 14th - Bracha Nechama Bomze; Reagan Upshaw
11/November 18th - George Quasha; Sam Truitt 3rd Saturday
12/December 9th - Lisa St. John; Lissa Kiernan and Annual Business Meeting

Also, why not become a 2023 Member of the Woodstock Poetry Society?

Membership is $20 a year. (To join, send your check to the Woodstock Poetry Society, P.O. Box 531, Woodstock, NY 12498. Include your email address as well as your mailing address and phone number. Or join online at: www.woodstockpoetry.com/become.html). Your membership helps pay for meeting space rental, post-office-box rental, the WPS website, and costs associated with publicizing the monthly events. One benefit of membership is the opportunity to have a brief biography and several of your poems appear on this website.

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