Leonard Gontarek and the Osage Poets

Wednesday August 12, 2015 – 7pm

Moonstone Poetry @ Fergie’s Pub – 1214 Sansom Street

Leonard Gontarek and the Osage Poets

“I have nothing but admiration and awe for The Osage Poets. There is not a more committed, talented, hard-working, supportive, interesting, exploring group of poets, anywhere.” 

Catherine Bancroft writes poetry and makes art and sometimes combines them. She has read her poetry at Green Line Café, the Philadelphia Poetry Festival, Fergie’s Pub, and other local spots.

James Brennan is author of the memoir Twenty-four Years to Boston, and is the Cityscape editor for the Schuylkill Valley Journal, his work has appeared in Everyday Fiction, Fringe, Salon.com and many other print and online media outlets.

Janet Fishman studied acting in Paris, was a member of a French theatre company, and has performed recently at Villanova, where she received her MA in Theatre.  Her two one person shows have toured as far as the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, via the QE2.   Her poems have appeared in Apiary Online.

Angel Hogan has performed as part of the Black Women’s Arts Festival, Literary Death Match and the Philadelphia Fringe Festival. She has acted as a Contributing Editor to Philadelphia Stories, a review panelist for the Philadelphia Cultural Fund, and a board member at The Hacktory

Jennifer Hook is author of This is How He Left Me, she chose poetry as an entry into the territory of loss and self reinvention. Among the places she has read her work are 100,000 Poets for Change, Poetic Feats of Strength, The Osage Poets at the Green Line Café, Philadelphia Poetry Day.

B.E  Kahn, a Pushcart Prize nominee, is author of 3 chapbooks, a recipient of PCA and Pew Grants, as well as other awards and prizes. Her poems have appeared in Harrisburg Review, Apiary, The Tupelo Press Online Poetry Project among many other journals.

Beth Krumholz, is a poet, artist, mom, daughter, sister, educator, gardener, cook, collector, bike rider, day tripper, and soon to be chanteuse. She received a Robert Rauschenberg Award in 2003, and continues to pursue her own art and poetry, collaborating with her nine year old son, Jacob.

Jerry Lindauer has been writing poetry for a few years and is a student of Leonard Gontarek.  He is also a semi-retired clinical social worker, husband, father and student of Zen and life.

Cassie MacDonald has been serving as Hearthkeeper of Brigid’s House, a home for writing, healing and hospitality in the artist district of South Camden known as “SoBro.” Cassie hasn’t been published much of anywhere, but still considers herself a “real” poet. Thank you for listening

M.C. McCoy’s poems have appeared in Apiary, The Birds We Piled Loosely, and Poetry Ink. She earned a BA in English from Temple University, and a dual Masters degree in Social Services and Law/Social Policy from Bryn Mawr College, where she is currently a doctoral student.

Aldona Middlesworth whose parents emigrated from Lithuania is a first-generation American born in the Chicago area and who lives now in near-by Germantown.  She teaches in Temple University’s Intellectual Heritage Program. 

After thirty years in the corporate world, Nancy H. Mills is now pursuing her passions in the arts. Writing poetry allows her to be the intrepid explorer, discovering the intricacies of nature, the depths of relations ships.

Barbara Russell Barbara is transitioning from designing needlepoint to poetry; working on a memoir. She is on the Board of Musehouse and received the 2014  Ronald Johnson Poetry Award.   Barbara was the featured speaker in May at the Rhythm and Verse Salon at the Daily Grind Café.

Elizabeth Helen Spencer is a freelance writer who also teaches in Temple’s First-Year-Writing program. She has published fiction, poetry and nonfiction in a variety of magazines.

Donna Wolf-Palacio has had two chapbooks of poetry, What I Don’t Know and The Other Side, she has published in Poetry, The Pennsylvania Gazette, Voices, Musehouse Journal, Intro, The Interpreter, and Writing from the Heart: Poems about Adoption. Donna has taught a poetry workshop at the University of the Arts and was editor/ consultant for the UARTS Poetry Review.

Sekai’Afua Zankel Sekai means the whole world in Japanese, Happiness and laugher in the Congo. Hatched in Philadelphia writing and working on her next manuscript: “Any Excuse Will Do”

Charles S. Carr-Host, No Open Reading Tonight