Cheryl Rice, the poetry diva of Kingston, just picked up more copies of her new book, “My Minnesota Boyhood” and she is ready to sell them to you. These collections of poetry are handcrafted by local small press publisher Dayl Wise at Post Traumatic Press.

If you do not know about Cheryl Rice and all that she does, here is a quick rundown:

Cheryl A. Rice’s work has appeared in Baltimore Review, Chronogram, Florida Review,  Home Planet News, Mangrove, Metroland, Poughkeepsie Journal, The Temple, Woodstock Times, and in the anthologies Wildflowers, Vol. II (2002: Shivastan Publishing),Riverine (2007: Codhill Press) andFor Enid, With Love (2010: NYQuarterly). She is the author ofA Thousand Candy Vaginas: Poems 1989-1995 (1997, Palaver Press), Aleums (1999, Flying Monkey Press), Egypt (2001, Flying Monkey Press), Nobody Slept Last Night (2003, Another Poor Bastard Productions, CD),Auction (2004, Flying Monkey Press; 2nd edition 2010), Girl Poet (2007, Flying Monkey Productions, CD), Roses: three poems (2011, Flying Monkey Press), and Outside (2011, Flying Monkey Press). Founder and host of the Sylvia Plath Bake-Off, Rice has held her RANDOM WRITING workshops throughout the Hudson Valley, where she has lived for over 30 years, after growing up on Long Island.

As many know Cheryl is one of the leaders and driving forces of the poetry scene in the Hudson Valley. She has hosted open mics, events, and workshops all over the region for many years, keeping the the art alive in upstate New York. And now is your chance to take a little bit of Cheryl home with you with this great new book, which I heard has been appearing on the desks of major players in the poetry world.

Here is what Cheryl says about the book:

“MY MINNESOTA BOYHOOD” is a collection of poems based part on fantasy, part on raw reality. In it, I compare my own upbringing on Long Island in the late 1960s with that of a friend’s who was raised at the same time in the hinterlands of Minnesota. Home Planet News publisher Donald Lev said of MY MINNESOTA BOYHOOD, “…with a novelist’s skill, [Rice] carves ice, water and fish into Moby Dick-like metaphor that sinks deep and stays…”

“My Minnesota Boyhood” is available from Post Traumatic Press (PO Box 544, Woodstock, NY 12498) or from Cheryl herself at Flying Monkey Productions, 16 S. Farrelly St., Kingston, NY 12401.

We have another busy week of poetry this week in upstate New York and one the big events that will be happening down in Treadwell at the Bright Hill Center for the Word Thursdays series hosted by Bertha Rogers. The two featured poets that Bertha lined up for this month, Helen Ruggieri and Judith Kerman are both well  published, much respected poets in the area.

At 7 pm on May 24, Word Thursdays will presents Olean poet Helen Ruggieri and Woodstock poet Judith Kerman; they will read from their work after the open mic, which begins at 7 pm, and during which all those attending are invited to read their own work or that of others for up to five minutes. The readings take place in the Word & Image Gallery (now featuring the mixed media works of Samir Sobhy) at Bright Hill Literary Center, 94 Church Street, Treadwell, one block north of Barlow’s General Store (Rtes 14 & 16).

HELEN RUGGIERI has been writing and publishing her work for thirty years. She has a book of short prose pieces (haibun) from Foothills Publishing called The Character for Woman, about living in Japan and a new book of poetry from Kitsune Books called Butterflies Under a Japanese Moon which has been nominated for a Pulitzer. Other books are Glimmer Girls from Mayapple Press about growing up female in the 50s; Concrete Madonna about the pink collar experience; and Rock City Hill Exercises about hiking in the Alleghenies. Japanese verse forms (haibun, haiku, senryu) have appeared in many American and international publications in Turkey, Belgium, England, Ireland, Russia, Slovakia and in Japan where her haiku have been published in Japanese/English newspapers and have won awards for haiku in English. She will be reading from her new book and other work.

JUDITH KERMAN is a poet, translator and publisher. She has published eight books or chapbooks of poetry, most recently Galvanic Response (March Street Press, 2005) and the bilingual collection, Plane Surfaces/Plano de Incidencia (Santo Domingo: CCLEH, 2002), with Spanish translations by Johnny Durán. Her two books of translations of Spanish-language poetry are Praises & Offenses: Three Women Poets from the Dominican Republic (BOA Editions, 2009) and A Woman in Her Garden: Selected Poems of Dulce María Loynaz (White Pine Press, 2002). Kerman was a Fulbright Senior Scholar to the Dominican Republic in 2002, translating the poetry and fiction of Dominican women writers. She runs Mayapple Press (1980-present) and was founding editor of Earth’s Daughters (1971 to present). She is the founder/coordinator of the Rustbelt Roethke Professional Writers’ Retreat (now Woodstock Mayapple Writers’ Retreat, 2003-present) and has led community writing groups since 1991. She was Dean of Arts and Behavioral Sciences (1991-1997) and Professor of English (1997-2011) at Saginaw Valley State University. Now Professor Emerita of English, she relocated from Michigan to Woodstock, NY, in summer 2011.

This reading, hosted by Mimi Moriarty at the Pine Hollow Arboretum in Slingerlands, featured 5 poets published this year by Finishing Line Press.

I am most familiar with Jan Tramontano‘s Paternal Nocturne which she has been reading around at various venues, including Albany WordFest. This evening she read 2 poems from each of the 3 sections of the chapbook, poems based on letters home written by her grandfather in the 1930s & 1940s. She ended with “the most personal” poem in the book, her own tender letter to him, “Letter 2011.”

Mimi Moriarty & her brother Frank Desiderio‘s chapbook Sibling Reverie pulls together some of their “companion” poems they have been writing & performing for a number of years. They read 4 sets, some like “A Matter of Substance on my TV” (Frank) & “Mummers Parade, January 1, 2010″ because they were both there; others pairings, notably “Afternoon Recreation” (Frank) & “Jesus at Bat” (Mimi) came about because they discovered that each had written about Jesus & baseball (which would almost get me to go to church again).

Jan Tramontano, Linda Sonia Miller, Mimi Moriarty, Frank Desiderio & Cecele Kraus

I was least familiar with the work of Linda Sonia Miller, whose chapbook from Finishing Line Press is titled Something Worth Diving For, which she said was an oblique reference to Adrienne Rich’s work. She began with a few recent poems not in the chapbook, “The She-bear’s Lament” & one about living in Paris in her youth, another about Thanksgiving. The poems she read from the book included the marvelous childhood memoir in the Bronx, “Poetry,” & one about watching herons.

I’ve also recently heard Cecele Allen Kraus read from her captivating chapbook, Tuscaloosa Bypass, memoir poems of growing up in Alabama. She read the beginning (“Every Sunday Morning”) & concluding (“Mississippi Encounter”) poems, & others. I was particularly moved by the poem “Mirror” about a dead brother, & the companion piece “Three Sisters.”

After the reading, the group fielded questions about being a poet & their experiences with the process of being published by Finishing Line Press. All in all a pleasant evening of poetry in the front room of the Pine Hollow Arboretum, a light & airy setting for small readings.

Tonight at The Linda (339 Central Ave., Albany) Urban Guerilla Theatre is back with the annual “Heartbreak Hotel” show. This is always a great night of poetry, music, spoken word, and whatever else Mojavi, Leslie Michelle, and the rest of the  UGT team can come up with.

Join the UGT team as we celebrate the return of “HEARTBREAK HOTEL” with some jaw-dropping poetry from the insatible BKLYN SHAY, SE’LAH THE AUTHOR, and the ever luminous Q DIAMOND.

Then meet and greet our newest member ERICA JOHNSON as she pours her heart out while the ever so sexy CARLOS GARCIA returns to the UGT stage! And that’s not all!…there will be some tear-jerking music from the fantastic duo NECCO & QUINTIN PIPER, ALICIA “VIDA” ORTIZ, jams from the UGT BAND and much much more!

Keep your eyes open for further details and keep in mind you can purchase your tickets right now online at: www.thelinda.org

Urban Guerilla Theatre is a Poetry/Spoken Word/Performance artists’ collective based in Albany, NY dedicated to reviving, redefining, and revolutionizing spoken word. The group employs various styles of poetry, music, spoken word and theatre to address life, love, relationships, social and societal issues. UGT also uses their open mic readings to host events and create an artistic space to house and develop artists and upcoming poets.

Here is a video highlighting last month’s “Skit Happens” show, part of the 2012 Albany Word Fest.

We have a lot of poetry events coming up next week. For another week in a row, there are seven full days of open mics and readings going on the upstate area starting on Sunday, May 20 with a great reading by the Delmar Writers group at the Bethlehem Library.

Sunday, May 20

2:00pm – Delmar Writers Reading
Bethlehem Library, 451 Delaware Avenue, Delmar, NY
The Delmar Writers will be reading at the Bethlehem Library, 451 Delaware Avenue, Delmar, NY.   Join them for a unique program where each prose piece will be echoed by a poem.  There will also be segments of poetry, as well.  Refreshments will be served.  A table of free books will be available, as well as books for sale from the authors.

Monday, May 21

5:30pm – Saint Poem: Coffee, Cigarettes & An Old School Open Mic For Poets On Lark
UAG Gallery, 247 Lark Street, Albany, NY 12210
Coffee, Cigarettes & An Old School Open Mic For Poets On Lark Street. New & Old Poets, Writers Welcome. This is an open mic. Hosted by R.M. Engelhardt.

7:00pm – Front Parlor Series
Olde English Pub, 683 Broadway, Quackenbush Sq., Albany, NY
At Front Parlor, hosted by Abby Lublin., storytellers volunteer their names in a can, and the MC selects the order at random. (Bribes encouraged.) Tellers share 5-minute stories based on a common theme.  Front Parlor also features “Flash Nonfiction”- 1-2 sentence, audience-submitted stories responding to a prompt based on the evening’s theme.  Flash nonfiction is a relatively painless way to share your stories.

7:30pm – Poets Speak Loud
McGeary’s, 4 Clinton Square, Albany, NY
On Monday, May 21 we will be hosting a special edition of Poets Speak Loud at McGeary’s hosted by Mary Panza. For this one night only poetry and spoken word will be mixed with the music of the Rambling Jug Stompers. This month our Featured Poet at Poets Speak Loud on the the Albany Poets website is Carlos Garcia.

7:30pm – Spring Street Reading Series
Spring Street Gallery, 110 Spring St., Saratoga Springs, NY
Spring Street Reading Series featuring Jon Katz. Seating limited to first 30; call 518-587-6433 for reservation. Co-sponsored by the Adirondack Center for Writing and the Spring Street Gallery.

8:00pm – Club Harmony
Wok ‘N Roll Cafe, 52 Mill Hill Road, Woodstock, NY
Weekly poetry open mic with featured reader hosted by Michael Platsky.

Tuesday, May 22

7:00pm – Emack and Bolio’s Open Mic Night
Emack & Bolio’s, Delaware Ave., Albany, NY
A weekly open mic for music and poetry

Wednesday, May 23

8:00pm – Pauly’s Hotel Open Mic Night
Pauly’s Hotel, 337 Central Ave., Albany, NY
Poetry, Music, Comedy and more take center stage at Pauly’s weekly Open Mic Night hosted by Keith Spencer.

Thursday, May 24

7:00pm – Rockhill Bakehouse Open Mic
Rockhill Bakehouse Cafe, 19 Exchange Street, Glens Falls, NY
Weekly open mic for musicians and writers

7:00pm – Every Other Thursday Night Poets
Voorheesville Public Library, 51 School Street, Voorheesville, NY
Adult Poetry Writers Support Group. Bring your own work for critique. No signup nec. Hosted by Dennis Sullivan.

7:00pm – Word Thursdays
Bright Hill Center, 94 Church St., Treadwell, NY
Open Mic followed by features New York Poet Jeanne Marie Beaumont and Olean Poet Helen Ruggieri. Hosted by Bertha Rogers.

8:00pm – Starving Artist Thursdays
Hudson River Coffee House, 227 Quail Street, Albany, NY 12203
A weekly open Mic for music, poetry, and spoken word at one of Albany’s best new coffee shops.

Friday, May 25

6:30pm – Poetry at Pine Hollow
Pine Hollow Arboretum Visitors Center, 16 Maple Ave., Slingerlands, NY
Open mic (three short poems, two longer poems, or two pages of prose) with featured poets Judith Kerman and Helen Ruggieri. Hosted by Alan Casline. Light refreshments. Donations welcomed.

Saturday, May 26

5:00pm – Heyday Poetry Series
Half Moon Books, 35 North Front Street, Kingston, NY, 12401
The Heyday Poetry Series at Half-Moon Books is every 4th Saturday of each month, hosted by Chris Wood. Open mic follows featured poet Walter Worden, suggested donation of $3.00 to support the feature. Acoustic music is also welcome! Come and share something with us, or just enjoy the performances and refreshments.

For our friends in Western Mass and Conneticut, be sure to check out The Poetry News from Lori Desrosiers. This is a weekly rundown of all of the readings, events, and open mics happening in New England.

It was a mighty crowd at Professor Java’s this past Monday night for the May edition of the Wide Open Mic. Kevin Peterson began the evening by reminding us that it was, in fact, the 83rd installment of this great open mic institution.

As for the open mic, we had a good mix of equal parts poetry and music. Half of the Normanskill Saxons kicked off the night and played a few pieces before Carol Jewell returned with a poem talking about Fenway Park in great detail. Erin Powers played a new song that she has been working on. The rest of the open mic consisted of poetry from a new poet (who’s name I did not catch), Kevin Peterson, Avery, and Thom Francis.

The challenge of the night was to come up with a piece from the prompt: “Pastor of Muppets”.

Another great night at the Sanctuary. We’ll be back next month on Monday, June 11 for the “84″ edition of the Wide Open Mic. Sign up starts at 7:15, open mic starts at 8:00.

Do you write haiku? Do you want to battle other haiku-ers to find out who is the best of the best? Well, if you are then we have the event for you. Our friends over at the WordXWord Festival in Pittsfield are holding a special Head-to-Head Haiku event on Tuesday, May 29.

This event is essentially a haiku slam with three rounds of competition. Anyone who would like to signup can do so online (http://wxwwr.org/wp/2012/05/5th-tuesday-slam-may-29/).

Here is how it all works:

Head-To-Head Haiku

Poets – aka Haikusters – come armed with at least 33 Haikus. In this case, Haiku is defined simply as a poem having a maximum of 17 syllables. No titles, no props.

3 judges selected from the audience, are equipped with red and non-red flags.

Haikusters are matched up in pairs for head-to-head competition

First Round

Each pair enters a head-to-head, best 2 out of 3 match. One poet is designated as “red” and one as “non-red.”

Each poet reads one poem and – after a momentary pause for contemplation – the judges raise either a red or non-red flag to indicate their vote. The “Gyoji” (aka slam master or host)  issues a point to the winner of the round. Then each poet reads their second poem. Judges vote, point is awarded. If necessary, a third poem is read, point is awarded and a match winner is declared.

Winner moves on to next round.

Repeat for all 4 first round matches, resulting in 4 survivors who move on to the second round.

Second Round

Second round proceeds as the first with the exception that it is “best 7 out of 13.” First poet to 7 wins.

Second round results in two finalists.

Third/Final Round

Final round is 9 out of 17. First poet to 9 wins!

Note - A poet who makes it to the final death match could potentially need 33 Haikus. Our recommendation? Get busy writing. On the bright side, we’re only looking at 561 syllables, roughly the equivalent of a couple of hundred words. That should be a cinch!

Thom Francis, el presidente, was a busy man tonight, hosting the open mic, keeping score & slamming. The open mic offered a great variety of poems & poets, starting with Leslie Michelle doing a poem by someone else, then Dustin “Nervous Cow” Walker with a tale about the death of his grandfather done as a series of snapshots (“The Camera”), Tasha with an untitled love poem, Carolee with a new poem based as a picture in her aprtment “Hades Confides in Persephone,” & Daniel Nester with a litany of the agony of puberty based on his journals when he was 12 years old.

At this point Dain Brammage took over as the Slam Bastard, I mean Master. But no sacrificial lamb tonight with the small crowd (they even had trouble getting judges). I had signed up for the Slam because at the time few had & by now there were 5 of us. I was first with perhaps the world’s shortest slam poem, coming in at 21 seconds, “Fat” (I love it a lady’s butt/but wish it wasn’t on my gut), & scoring 23.9, enough to make me 5th & thus the only one eliminated in the first round. The rest of the field, Shannon Shoemaker, Elizag, Jess ListenToMyWords & Thom Francis advanced to the 2nd round.

Thom Francis, Elizag, Dain Brammage & Shannon Shoemaker

When that dust settled Elizag was #1 & there was a tie for 2nd place, so rather than battling it out, Thom & Shannon shared the second place honor (normally, the 1st & 2nd place Slammers would battle it out, with 3rd resting on her/his laurels, but this way everyone was honored without undo strife).

Twice a month at Valentines on New Scotland Ave., just down the street from Washington Park, in Albany, NY, the 1st & 3rd Tuesdays, $5.00, a Slam & an open mic (you can only do 1 or the other). & beer.

Some people love them. Some people don’t care for them. Some folks don’t like the idea of poetry as competition. Some performers thrive on the rush of being on stage. Anyway you look at it, slam poetry is one of the most dynamic and exciting literary spectacles around.

Poetry slams have been around since November 1984 when Marc Smith started it all in Chicago. Since then many poets and performers have graced the stages of small clubs and huge venues all over the country. In Albany, we have hosted two different poetry slams over the past ten years, Project:SLAM! at the Bayou and currently Nitty Gritty Slam at Valentine’s. Personally, I have been a fan of it since I first saw an episode of Def Poetry on HBO in 2002. Since then I have been consistently inspired and impressed with how these poets are able to combine powerful words and emotion with performance only to be judged the whole time.

Here is my list of ten of my favorite slam performance videos (in no particular order). You may recognize some of these poets, especially the ones from right here in Albany. Also, this is in no way a complete list. There are so many great slam poets and spoken word artists that I admire that I may have to do a part two.

1 – Big Poppa E – The Wussy Boy Manifesto

2 – Andrea Gibson- How It Ends

3 – Saul Williams – Coded Language

4 – Brian Omni Dillon – What Would Jesus Do

5 – Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz – Use Your Words

6 – Kevin Peterson – Vice Verses at NGS #11

7 – Jon Sands – What I Know

8 – Taylor Mali – What Teachers Make

9 – Marc Smith performing at the Green Mill in Chicago

10 – Black Ice – The Ugly Show

Those are some of my favorites. How about you? Who are your favorite slam poets? What pieces have stuck with you? Let me know in the comments.

Bonus – Jive Poetic – Clone Wars / Grapes

No one signed up in the first slot so I took it & read Julia Ward Howe’s 1870 Mothers’ Day Proclamation, then my own “Mothers Day Meditation,” both anti-war statements.

Harvey Havel had a strange, untitled prose piece about a coup by a pitt bull in a nation of dogs (with this great line, “with approval the audience barked like mad”). Brett Axel has just had a children’s book published, Goblinheart: A Fairy Tale, but his poems circled around his mother, the very short “Red Paint,” “My Mother Became an Artist…” (painting pictures with mercurochrome), “Mother” (as an invalid), & “Birthday.” Tim Verhaegen is known for his poems about his family & included one for his mother, “Is She Crazy or Just Plain Mean?” but began & ended with rants, one about “writers who don’t write” & the other a list culled from the news about heroes, some ironic, some not. Howard Kogan began with “This Dream” then the tender, chilling account of his mother’s family stuck in Poland in “The Great War.”

A new reader, all the way from across state lines, was Naomi Bindman, beginning with an older poem “Spring Waking,” then touching on the day’s theme with “In Praise of my Daughter’s Navel,” & the sad, & tender “Run Over;” “Fallen” was a love poem & she ended with “Invisible.” My co-host, Nancy Klepsch, hadn’t signed up to read, but before she announced the next-to-last reader “stole a moment” (as she put it) to pay tribute to a teacher from high school who was her “poetry mother,” Nancy Fagan. Ron Drummond spent some time rattling his papers before he launched into the end of his piece he had read excerpts from previously, “The First Woman on Mars.” Trina Porte ended up as the last reader of the afternoon (after a battle over who would be the last reader) with the graphic description of a hospitalized person, “Inpatient” then a piece whose title I think was “Rose.” And that was the end.

This series continues next month on the 2nd Sunday at 2:00 PM at the Arts Center of the Capital Region, 265 River St., Troy, NY — free! & open to writers of prose & poetry.