Author Archives: Christopher

LiterarY Dinner & Reading!

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What a wonderful time I had reading poetry on Saturday night at the LiterarY Dinner! So great to see so many friends in the audience! Thank you so much everyone for coming out and supporting the Syracuse YMCA Arts programs. Thank you to my fellow reader Cheryl Reed, and musical artists Daniel Fields and Sabine Krantz. Thank you to our hosts Neva and Richard Pilgrim and Johanna Keller and Charles Martin. Warmth and good company on a cold February night!

 

 

(Thank you to Cheryl Reed for this photograph of us)

 

Collaborative Prose Poem “The Star Wars Sheets I Had at Five” in Inter|rupture

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I’m delighted to share the news that my collaborative prose poem, “The Star Wars Sheets I had at Five,” written with Dustin Nightingale, has just been published in the final issue of Inter|rupture, beside a host of other new and fellow former contributors, including John Gallaher, Gale Marie Thompson, Brandon Amico, Noah Falck, Mary Biddinger, John Sibley Williams, Dalton Day, Adam Tedesco, Jennifer MacBain-stephens, just to name a few wonderfuls. Congratulations to editors Curtis Perdue, Elizabeth Onusko, and Anna Pollock-Nelson on a great run and an awesome final issue, and best wishes on your future projects!

Read said poem HERE.

Read our previous contribution, “The Weight of Everything,” from the Oct 2014 issue HERE.

Poetry Reading in Syracuse Saturday February 17, 2018

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Dear friends. I’m giving a poetry reading next Saturday, February 17 as part of a LiterarY Dinner in support of the Syracuse YMCA Arts Branch and The Downtown Writer’s Center and all of the amazing and valuable work they do in the community. The cost for attending is $50. I’ll be reading my poetry for ten minutes. The evening will also include a prose reading by novelist Cheryl Reed. There’ll be music. There’ll be food. There’ll be great fun.

If you’re interested please RSVP the hosts. Complete info below. Feel free to share with anyone you think might be interested.

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•Hosts: Neva & Dick Pilgrim, Charles Martin & Johanna Keller 917-584-1878
•Date: SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 17 AT 6:00 PM
•Location: The Pilgrim Home / 438 Brookford Rd Syracuse, NY
•Featuring: Poet Christopher Citro & Novelist Cheryl Reed as well as Musical Artists!
•To Benefit YMCA Arts

DON’T YOU DESERVE A GREAT NIGHT OUT IN FEBRUARY?
Brrr, it’s cold. If you have been with us in the past, you know this is a fantastically warm party for the coldest month! If you are new to the Y programs, you’ll find it’s a terrific community of truly caring people. Please join us for the annual LiterarY Dinner in support of the YMCA Arts Branch and the Downtown Writers Center. The Y Arts Branch offers extraordinary programs that enrich our town.
The evening includes dinner, wine, entertainment and fabulous company.
For more than a decade, members of the cultural community all over Syracuse host dinners in their homes to raise money for the Y Arts Branch and its programs. All the hospitality is donated and poets and writers and musicians donate their services too.
A tax-deductible donation of $50 per person is requested (please RSVP and bring cash or a check with you on that evening made out to YMCA Syracuse). Every dollar raised goes to the Y arts programs that enrich our town and bring arts to children of our community.
So, for the cost of a dinner out, you get dinner out AND entertainment AND a whole lot more fun AND do some tax-deductible good….We hope you can join us!
Johanna Keller & Charles Martin
Neva Pilgrim & Dick Pilgrim

Teaching 2 Creative Writing Workshops This Winter at The Downtown Writer’s Center in Syracuse NY

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I’m thrilled to share the news that I’ll be teaching two eight-week creative writing workshops this winter at The Downtown Writer’s Center in sunny Syracuse, NY — a Monday night poetry workshop focusing on very contemporary poetry from literary journals and recent books and a Wednesday night workshop focusing on the lyric essay (the lyric essay course will be a repeat of the course I taught last year). Both classes begin the last week of January (see the class descriptions below). Registration is inexpensive and open to the public. To learn more about The Downtown Writer’s Center, download the spring class schedule, and register for these workshops, visit the Center’s website HERE. Feel free to share with anyone who might be interested!

In the Landscape of Contemporary Poetry with Christopher Citro. Mondays, 6:00-8:00. 8 weeks, starting January 29. “I have/enough ink to give you the sea” writes Ocean Vuong in his 2016 book, Night Sky with Exit Wounds. We’ll discuss poetry from recent books or journals, then use prompts from our readings to inspire new writing

The Lyric Essay with Christopher Citro. Wednesdays, 6:00-8:00. 8 weeks, starting January 31. “The lyric essay partakes of the poem in its density and shapeliness, its distillation of ideas and musicality of language. It partakes of the essay in its weight, in its overt desire to engage with facts” (Tall & D’Agata). Explore this exciting hybrid genre, using prompts to inspire.

“A Lot Going On Up There” Is Poem of the Week at Narrative!

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I’m thrilled to share the news that my poem “A Lot Going On Up There” has just been published as the Poem of the Week at Narrative Magazine! You can read the poem HERE (logging in is required to read the poem in its entirely, but it’s completely free to do so!) Thank you so much Jack, Carol, Tom, and the rest of the staff at Narrative!

“It’s Something People in Love Do” in the Pushcart Prize Anthology 2018

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Thank you to Bill Henderson and the other editors of The Pushcart Prize Anthology for including my poem “It’s Something People in Love Do” in the newly published 2018 edition! Having received my contributor’s copy not long ago, I’m still reeling from the honor. Thank you to all the journal editors who have nominated my work over the years, and most especially to Lee Upton and Tony Ardizzone for nominating my work this year. Thanks again to Anthony Sutton, Mitchell Jacobs, Rachel Reynolds, and the other editors at Sycamore Review for giving this poem a home in the first place!

“Shelter Awhile” and “Smell of Wet Earth Like the Inside of My Hands” Accepted at Colorado Review

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Huuuuuuge thanks to the good folks at the Colorado Review for accepting my poems “Shelter Awhile” and “Smell of Wet Earth Like the Inside of My Hands” — the latter being one of the very few sonnets I’ve ever had survive into a final draft. So huzzah! This will be the second time my work has appeared in the Colorado Review, since they were good enough to publish my first lyric essay “Go Ahead and Stay Right Here” back in the Spring 2014 issue. So double thanks and huzzahs!