Book sales and Food Banks

Earlier this year, USDA announced that they would be cutting over $1 billion in support for food banks and school lunch programs. This money had been earmarked to purchase fresh food from local farms and producers for these programs, which meant that not only would food banks and those who rely on them be harmed, but also local farmers who had planned on a portion of their crops to be purchased through the program. At the same time, Ohio's budget, passed this summer, also cut statewide funding for food banks.

My day job location has hosted a monthly produce pick up with one of the area food banks since the beginning of the pandemic. Cars will be lined up down the street, and people will literally wait for hours to get their bags of fresh produce and other staples. And the demand has only been increasing at the same time that state and federal funding has been cut for these programs.

Last year alone, Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank distributed 40 million pounds of food and other essential items, distributed 11 million pounds of fresh produce, providing 31.4 million meals. Every dollar received by the Foodbank provides multiple meals. I can't think of any organizations that can stretch a dollar like our food banks can. If any "waste" is happening, it's not happening in our food banks.

So let's talk about book sales.

All sales of The Roads at Night Looked Like Our Futures: A 40 Over 40 Poetry Anthology, will directly benefit the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank. And your first opportunity to purchase the anthology will be at our book launch event on Sunday, August 17, 2pm, at the Akron-Summit County Public Library Main Branch (60 S High St, Akron, OH 44326). We're asking for a $10 donation per book. We'll be collecting cash onsite, or if you prefer to donate by card, we'll have a qr code to connect you directly to the Foodbank's website. 

Join us Sunday! All contributors will have the opportunity to read their poems from the anthology, and it should be a great celebration. 

 I'll see you there! 

Book Launch!

 

Sunday, August 17, 2025
2pm-4pm
Akron-Summit County Public Library-Main Branch
60 S High St, Akron, OH 44326

Join us! 

The Roads at Night Looked Like Our Futures: A 40 Over 40 Poetry Anthology will be launched with a reading and celebration event, featuring poets from the anthology. This project is generously funded by an ArtsForward Grant. All proceeds from sales of the book benefit the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank. This event is free and open to the public. All are welcome! Join us!

Poets appearing in the anthology include: Michelle Moore, Cheryl A Townsend, Geoffrey A. Landis, Barbara Sabol, Tom Barlow, R Lansing, Marc Mannheimer, Haylee Schwenk, Keith Allison, Adrian Schnall, Diane Kendig, Dr. Mary E. Weems, Thomas Dukes, J. J. Shapiro, Philip Metres, Michael Shoffstall, Diane Renee Fencl, Connie Kopko Kramer, Jessica Bowers Ross, Dail Duncan, Barbara Marie Minney, dan smith, Laurie Kincer, Pamela R. Anderson-Bartholet, Stasha Powell, renee hope, Lori Ruth Ingram, Alan S. Ambrisco, Joanna Schroeder, Constance V. Plumley, Charles Malone, Diane Suchetka, Chandra Alderman, Chuck Carlise, Lacie Semenovich, Caryl Church-Jesseph, Ray McNiece, Adam Brodsky, Christine Wright, Cora McCann Liderbach, David Kniceley, Zachary T. Kalinoski, Steve Brightman, Shaneen Harris, Michelle R. Smith, and Theresa Göttl Brightman.

Reminder! Don't wait!

 If you're like me, you see a deadline, and that date feels so far off that you just put it off for a bit. You tell yourself, "I have SOOO much time to put together the perfect submission for this!" You file it in an email folder that you SWEAR to yourself you're going to look at and remind yourself. You promise yourself you will do it tonight, or tomorrow, or definitely by the weekend.

This is your two-ish week warning.

The deadline to submit to the 40 Over 40 Anthology is April 30, which might sound like a lot of time when it's only April 14, but you know you get distracted by things like work and chores and holidays and family stuff and the next thing you know, it will be May 1.

**
Because I know the algorithm means this might be your first time hearing about this--the 40 Over 40 Anthology is funded by an ArtsForward grant. Poets in Northeast Ohio (or who have a past or present connection to the area) who are over the age of 40 may submit between now and April 30 to be included in an anthology to be released in August 2025. Submissions are free, and accepted poets will receive a $40 honorarium, copy of the print publication, and an invitation to read at the book launch celebration at Akron Main Library on Sunday, August 17. Full details in the link below.
**

So don't wait.

Don't.
Wait.

Send your submission now, and enjoy that feeling of ease and satisfaction when you've accomplished a thing on your to-do list that is something you wanted to do for yourself. And then you did it! Huzzah!

Send your poems.

 

Submit HERE!

Meet the judges!

 

I didn't want to be selecting the poems for the 40 Over 40 anthology (submit here!) myself and turn this into a collection of my personal favorite things. It was important to me to assemble a judging panel of brilliant, talented poets with different styles to help compile a great collection. It was also important to me to make sure that we had a blind judging process.

I could not be more excited that all three of these individuals wanted to be part of this project. Below, get to know a little about them and--most importantly if you're submitting--what they look for when reading poems.

 

Michelle R. Smith is a writer, poet, educator, cultural facilitator, and native Clevelander. She is the Programming Director for Literary Cleveland. She is the author of the poetry collections Ariel in Black (2015) and The Vagina Analogues (2020). She has been published in The Normal School, The Gasconade Review, New Note Poetry, Merge Magazine, and io Literary Magazine.

Michelle says: "I appreciate soul, song, story, sensory detail, and spareness in poetry. I like emotionality, elegance, intelligence, and craftsmanship."
 
 
Shaneen Harris’s works include Reflections of My Thoughts: I used to believe in unicorns, and I still do, Because God Said So, and Simply Complex (spoken word CD). Her poem “Clergy Woman Eats Her Shadow” was a finalist in the Wolverine Farm Broadside Poetry Prize. Her writings have appeared in Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine, Rubbertop Review, Crab Orchard Review: Ka-Ching the Money Issue, Watershed Review, Rattle, and the Tampa Review. She served as host of Poetry Unchained and TBN’s Joy in Our Town and Co-Editor of When There Are Nine. Shaneen’s married and the proud momma of three adult children.

Shaneen says what she looks for in poetry is "the poem's ability to make me believe that it is the originator. For instance, if it’s a poem about love, it’s written in a way that is a fresh perspective. I also look at the word choice and flow of the poem. More complexity isn’t always deeper on meaning. Did the last word of a line make me want to read the next one?"

 

 

Steve Brightman lives in Akron OH. His most recent full-length collection of poems, The Circus of His Bones (Kung Fu Treachery Press), is a pandemic baby, birthed in 2020. Other collections of his include The Wild Gospel of Careening and Other Tales from the Rumble Strip, Leaving the Flatlands to the Amateurs, In Brilliant Explosions Alone, and 13 Ways of Looking at Lou Reed.
 

When asked what he looks for in a poem, Steve says:

"It’s a short list, but a big ask.

1) I want to see the specific in a universal way

2) I want to see the universal in a specific way

3) I want to see the world reflected back to me or revealed to me in a way I haven’t yet seen"

 

Now that you've met the judges, plan your submissions and send them in before April 30th!
Submit here!

Peace,
T

Meet the workshop leaders!

As part of the 40 Over 40 project, I also wanted to include poetry workshops to foster the craft of writing. I didn't want this project to only be about publishing a book. Full stop. I wanted the project to be about poetry in the community. I wanted some place for people to find fresh inspiration, or to explore the craft in a safe space, even without any poetry experience.

And I am thrilled to have Diane Kendig and Barbara Sabol on board to teach two upcoming workshops. Diane will be talking about the list poem, but looking at it in new ways you've never considered. Barbara will be sharing her thoughts on the ode, and how adaptable and relevant it is to modern poetry.


Both workshops will take place at Summit Artspace (140 E. Market Street, Akron, OH) at 2pm. Bring a pen and notebook (or laptop, if you prefer) and an excitement to explore new poetry ideas.



Saturday, March 15 - LISTING, with Diane Kendig

Lists, whether you make them down the page or in a cloud, get us started, keep us on track, and
send us off to get our work done. In poetry, first, of course, there is the list poem. Like
Christopher’s long list of his cat’s tributes, Jubilate agno. But there are contemporary poems that
use the idea of lists, like Nancy Willard’s “Questions My Son Asked Me, Answers I Never Gave
Him.” And poems that have lists within them but aren’t all lists, like Lynn Powell’s “Blue.”
We are going to start by brainstorming some lists. Then we will look at different types of list-
inspiring poems and turn our storm into poems asea, listing perhaps as they sail.


Diane Kendig‘s latest books are Woman with a Fan and Prison Terms, and she co-edited the tribute anthology, In the Company of Russell Atkins. Kendig led the University of Findlay creative writing program including a prison writing workshop for 18 years and now back home in Canton, she curates Cuyahoga County Public Library’s weblog “Read + Write” and writes for “Free Poetry Cleveland.”


Saturday, April 26 - The Ode, with Barbara Sabol

The Ode: Considering the Contemporary Praise Poem
In this workshop we will briefly review the history of the ode as a form of lyric praise, discuss
features of the contemporary ode (and anti-ode) with reference to example poems, and engage in
writing and sharing our own odes.

Barbara Sabol was named Ohio Poet of the Year for her collection, WATERMARK (Alternating
Current Press, 2023.) Her book, IMAGINE A TOWN, won the 2019 Sheila-Na-Gig Editions
Poetry Prize. Other honors include an Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council.
She conducts workshops through Literary Cleveland and the Cuyahoga Falls Library. Barbara
lives in Akron, Ohio with her bird carver husband and wonder dog.

I hope to see at one or both of these upcoming workshops!
Life, Love, Light,
T

Submission link is live!

 Send your poems here!

When you want something to happen, sometimes you need to do it yourself

The world is a weird place right now. I've found myself swinging wildly from heartbroken anger, to creative excitement, and the artists in my life keep reminding me that both are important, that we need the art to remind us about what we're fighting for.

So I'm sharing about this project that will be taking up a large portion of my time in 2025.

40 Over 40: A Poetry Anthology

I'm going to publish an anthology of local poets, in Summit and surrounding counties, who are over 40 years old.

The idea came to me a few years ago when I was scanning submission listings for various prizes, awards, and fellowships, many of which were targeted at young writers, and thinking about those lists that have titles like, "30 writers under 30 to watch!" I realized that I was aging out of those kinds of recognitions. I started wondering about people who don't come to their craft until later in life. I started thinking about people who don't have the name recognition, but have put in the time to learn their craft. Life doesn't stop at 30. Some of us are just finding our feet under us in our 40s or even later.

When you want to see something happen, sometimes you need to do it yourself.

I put the idea out into the world and applied for an ArtsForward grant, and in a head-snapping who-what-me way, ArtsNow gave me the money to do it!

So I'm thrilled that I have the opportunity to make this anthology happen, in the WAY I want to make it happen. I wanted to recognize poets over 40 (we're not asking how MUCH over 40!) writing exciting work, and to pay those who are accepted into the anthology (more on that in the follow ups about submission details). I wanted to make sure that I had the ability to compensate everyone who was involved for their time--not just in copies, but in a way that says your work and expertise is valued.

If I was going to do this, I wanted to do it the right way. And ArtsNow is giving me that opportunity.


A few dates to note right now:

March 1-April 30 - Submissions will be open! Submissions are free! I will be posting the link everywhere, but it will also be on this page!

March 15 and April 26 at 2pm, we will be hosting two FREE community poetry workshops at Summit Artspace! If you need inspiration, or just want to create some work, we'll have two guest teachers leading you through some exercises to help you create new poems. These classes will be just one more way to support writers (and anyone curious about learning more about writing poetry) in the community. Diane Kendig will be teaching on 3/15, and Barbara Sabol will be teaching on 4/26!

I'll be sharing more exciting details soon, so stay tuned to this page here. But start looking for the poems you want to submit to the anthology.

Life, Love, and Light.
T