Woodstock Poetry Society
Featured Reading and Open Mike
Saturday, September 13th, 2025 at 2pm
SPECIAL LOCATION: Woodstock Mothership
6 Sgt Richard Quinn Drive/6 Hillcrest Ave
Woodstock, NY 12498

HYBRID: in-person and virtually via Zoom

Alice Graves
Lucia Cherciu

Poets Alice Graves and Lucia Cherciu will be the featured readers, along with an open mike when the Woodstock Poetry Society when the Woodstock Poetry Society meets in person and streamed via Zoom on Saturday, September 13th, 2025 at 2pm(eastern). Please note: this month only we will be meeting at the Woodstock Mothership; 6 Sgt Richard Quinn Drive/6 Hillcrest Ave; Woodstock, NY 12498.

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

Special Location:
Woodstock Mothership
6 Sgt Richard Quinn Drive/6 Hillcrest Ave
Woodstock, NY 12498

The Zoom app can be downloaded here: Zoom Download Center

To attend: 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:

Alice Graves - Alice’s prose and poetry has been published in Chronogram, Ducts.com, Sunscripts, Junoesque, and other publications. She worked as a freelance writer for the St. Petersburg Times, has written content for business and health websites, and was one of the original content writers for LegalZoom.com. Her books include The Small Library Manager’s Handbook and Don’t Tell Anyone: A Cult Memoir (available on Amazon). She holds an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University.



Lake Tear in the Clouds

I am thinking
of writing a poem
about the Hudson River

its 315-mile journey begins
Lake Tear in the Clouds
five thousand feet high
on Mt. Marcy
the highest peak
in the Adirondacks
where mountains
rip through the clouds

the Lenape,
who lived on its shores,
called it “river that flows
both ways”

feeling the ocean’s
tidal pulse
all the way to Troy, New York,
the river flows northward
twice every 24 hours
the ocean providing
nourishment and resources

making the Hudson
an arm of the sea

before writing
I opened the book,
Fidelity, by Grace Paley

I found a poem
about the Hudson River
inspired by a poem
by her friend Paul Goodman,
who described Hudson
as “lordly”

the Lordly Hudson,
like many of us
who are rather ordinary,
struggles each day
to find home

when finally
here is the open sea
here is home

-Alice Graves

*

Lucia Cherciu - Lucia Cherciu is a Professor of English at Dutchess Community College and served as the 2021-2022 Dutchess County Poet Laureate. She is the author of six books of poetry, including Immigrant Prodigal Daughter (Kelsay Books, 2023), Train Ride to Bucharest (Sheep Meadow Press, 2017), which received the Eugene Paul Nassar Poetry Prize, Edible Flowers (Main Street Rag, 2016), Lalele din Paradis / Tulips in Paradise (Editura Eikon, 2017), Altoiul Râsului / Grafted Laughter (Editura Brumar, 2010), and Lepadarea de Limba / The Abandonment of Language (Editura Vinea, 2009). Her work was nominated multiple times for a Pushcart Prize and for Best of the Net.



Practicing the New Way

My mother would like to give me
a jar of honey in which she macerated dandelions
from our mountains in Vrancea.
I tell her a long story by way of refusal.
My brother simply says no.
Honey would be good, but dandelions
we surely have enough on our lawn.
She tells me that dandelions
are good for the heart,
for the liver, for disposition.
After twenty-eight years of carrying
across the ocean the luggage
large enough to fit myself,
I am learning not to lug
things back.

I remember thirty years ago
when I left for graduate school
in Colorado
she roasted a chicken
and pressured me to pack it.
I didn’t take it then either.

But as soon as I arrive back
in Poughkeepsie
for the first time with my luggage
half empty—
after practicing my new way
of living in the world—
the first thing I regret not accepting
is her jar of honey with dandelions.
Don’t get me wrong. I have been
missing that roasted chicken with thyme
all my life. And today
how I wish I could start
that journey again,
fearlessly preparing for that long flight
and feasting on sagacity and stories.

-Lucia Cherciu

This poem was first published in “Southern Review” in 2024.

*

Developing WPS 2025 Schedule - now in-person at the Woodstock Library and via Zoom
All WPS Events: Events

01/January 11th - Guy Reed; Will Nixon
02/February 8th - Alison Koffler; Dayl Wise
03/March 8th - Charlie Cody; Mike Jurkovic
04/April 12th - Poetry Month-"Remembering Poets Passed"
05/May 10th - Roberta Gould; Vivi Hlavsa
06/June 14th - Irene Sipos; Perry S. Nicholas
07/July 12th - Lee Slonimsky; Robert Charles Basner
08/August 9th - Matthew J. Spireng; Suzanne Cleary
09/September 13th - Alice Graves; Lucia Cherciu (Special Location: Woodstock Mothership)
10/October 11th - Raphael Kosek; Tristan Geary (Special Location: Woodstock Mothership)
11/November 8th - Cheryl A. Rice; Linda McCauley Freeman
12/December 13th - Bruce Weber; Tom Bonville and Annual Business Meeting

Follow the WPS on Facebook: www.facebook.com/WoodstockPoetry/ and why not become a 2025 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.

(click here to close this window)