Come gather round people, wherever you roam!

Guess what time it is?

It's open mic night time is what.




Come to the

Unitarian Universalist Church

@ 701 B Ave.

Saturday night at 6:30

Unfortunately, I was not able to attend the last reading, but the famous Terry Gresham was there, and he made a post featuring two of the poems read that night, by Monty May.

Here is one of them:

MUSIC

Sing and play,
Cast a ray,
Draw from the wealth within you;
Dance, direct-
Use your own dialect,
The Muses are waiting to guide you.

Day raining dreams,
Sky reigning themes;
Circling motions of wonder-
Rising within, rising without,
Ringing like carols of thunder!

You can read the other at Terry's awesome blog, Toenail Moon, where he also keeps his poetry, links to interesting things, and musings about Frenchmen, Woodchucks, hipsters and werewolves.

I hope both Terry and Monty will be back tomorrow night, and I hope to see you there, too!

Labor Omnia Vincit

Oklahoma Laborfest sounds like it's going to be great!

The festival takes place in Oklahoma City's

Plaza District

from

August 26th to August 28th.

It will begin with a poetry reading at Coffy's Cafe, hosted by Jeanetta Calhoun Mish, whose book, Work is Love Made Visible: Poetry and Family Photographs, won the 2010 Oklahoma Book Award for Poetry.



Several Oklahoma writers will read, including our own Aaron Rudolph, Jason Poudrier and more. Lawton will be represented! Let us know if you are going, too.

Here's a link to a map of the Plaza District.

Here's the schedule of events for the rest of the weekend, including panel discussions, screenings of documentaries, live music and art shows!

The festival will wrap up with "Labor Speaks," an event that "will include dramatic readings of selected historical texts from Oklahoma’s labor and civil rights movement as well as musical performances of songs connected to these movements."

This is a great opportunity to support the arts and to learn about Oklahoma history.

Submit to OKIE

OKIE Magazine posted this to their Facebook page the other day:

Photographers, artists, musicians, writers ...OKIE is currently seeking submissions for inclusion in upcoming issues of our publication. Please click the link below for details on submitting your works. Want to help out with the magazine on a regular basis and be part of a great group of volunteers - drop me a line at editor@okiemagazine.com .

OKIE Magazine Submission Guidelines

I may have mentioned in another post or four that I write for the OKIE, and I can tell you ... they might be trying to find people who are more punctual and less pirate-talky.

Seriously, though. I love writing for OKIE Mag or even thinking of things to write for it. The process always introduces me to new ways of appreciating the things that are happening right around me. I've interviewed people for a couple of the articles I've written, and now I find that I am always thinking of interview questions I want to ask the people I meet. I now notice interesting places around town that I might have passed by before. Because I'm looking for them. I'm beginning to think about Lawton as a story I want to tell people. So that's why I like writing for OKIE Mag.

I believe at some point I will also be given a free t-shirt or something like that.

Anyway, I hope you'll check out the latest issue and consider contributing to a future issue. Occasionally, OKIE Magazine will consider poetry and fiction as well as non-fiction, though they are not a literary magazine.