Aug
19

There's A Lot to Unpack Here x A Velvet Giant

There’s A Lot to Unpack Here is a poetry and storytelling series that breaks the cardinal rule of art – actually explaining what is going on in a piece. It is an evening that invites poets, patrons of the art, and those who have said “I don’t understand what any of this means” alike to a space that facilitates sharing original work and the education of poetics through interviewing its readers before a live audience.

Doors at 7:30pm, show at 8pm.

FEATURED PERFORMERS :

Youngseo Lee

Suzanne Highland

Cindy Tran

Dev Murphy

Leon Barros

Hosted by Cierra Martin and co-produced with The Poetry Society of New York. Donations are encouraged but not required. For more information, visit @taltuhpoetry on Instagram!

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/theres-a-lot-to-unpack-here-x-a-velvet-giant-819-tickets-687474052397

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Jun
12

Brooklyn Poets Yawp Workshop with Cindy Tran

Touted as the “best poetry event in the borough” by Brooklyn Magazine and “one of the most innovative literary events in the city” by Time Out New York, the Brooklyn Poets Yawp is a monthly poetry workshop & open mic held on the second Monday of every month from 6:30 to 9 PM. The event is hosted at 144 Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights and also livestreamed via Zoom (closed captions available).

6:00 PM: doors open / open mic sign-up begins

6:30 to 7:30 PM: generative writing workshop

7:45 to 9 PM: open mic

Guests can purchase tickets to attend in person at 144 Montague Street or virtually via Zoom (note: virtual guests cannot read for the open mic). Advance online ticket sales end at 4 PM on the day of the event. After that, tickets for in-person attendance can be purchased at the door until we reach capacity; tickets for virtual attendance will no longer be available. After 4 PM, a Zoom link will be emailed to virtual ticket holders. Participants are encouraged to purchase tickets in advance for in-person attendance, as the event usually sells out. Brooklyn Poets members take $5 off.

Each reader for the open mic can read one poem of 3 minutes max. Participants can purchase one of ten tickets in advance to reserve an open mic spot. Once those tickets sell out, all other participants who’d like to read for the open mic can purchase a ticket to sign up at the door on a first-come, first-serve basis. We usually have time for about 20–22 readers.

One poem at every open mic is declared Yawp Poem of the Month by audience vote. The winning writer earns a Brooklyn Poets tote bag, one of twelve spots in our Yawp Poem of the Year contest and a ticket to our annual Awards Gala in December. We record and publish a monthly Yawpcast, so note that by reading you’re giving us permission to distribute your recording, unless you notify us otherwise.

Also note that by participating in the Yawp, you agree to abide by our code of conduct and COVID-19 policy. All in-person attendees are strongly encouraged to wear masks (regardless of vaccination status) except readers at a safe distance on stage, and we will have masks available. Brooklyn Poets reserves the right to dismiss from our programs any participant found to be in violation of these policies. Thank you for respecting our community.

Next Yawp: Mon, June 12, 144 Montague Street
Workshop Leader & Featured Reader: Cindy Tran

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Jul
23

Brooklyn Poets Grand Opening & Tenth Anniversary Party

Join us as we celebrate the grand opening of our first brick-and-mortar space at 144 Montague Street along with our tenth anniversary on Saturday, July 23, in historic Brooklyn Heights!

We'll kick things off with a ribbon cutting at 1 PM, followed by a free drop-in writing class on self-portraits at 1:30 led by Founder & Executive Director Jason Koo. Starting at 3 PM, we'll be treated to poetry readings by Brooklyn Poets alumni, faculty, Yawpers, board directors, staff and special guests, including Edward Hirsch, D. Nurkse and Brooklyn Poet Laureate Tina Chang. (Look for our social media announcement about the full lineup soon!)

In celebration of our tenth anniversary, guests will receive a free commemorative magazine featuring poems and essays by community members and highlighting some of the incredible achievements of our alumni, including almost 140 books published or forthcoming, many of which will be available in the bookstore of our new space. We'll also be unveiling new T-shirts and tote bags, including baseball tees honoring the newest members of our BKP Hall of Fame: June Jordan and Richard Wright.

We'll have food, drinks and music throughout the day, and guests can enjoy car-free access to Montague Street between Clinton Street and the Brooklyn Heights Promenade as part of this summer's Open Streets on Montague sponsored by the Brooklyn Heights Association and Montague BID.

Due to the current high transmission level of COVID-19 in the NYC area, all guests at our grand opening are required to wear a mask, except for readers at a safe social distance on stage. We invite you to read our full COVID-19 policy.

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Jun
13

Brooklyn Poets Yawp Workshop

Touted as the “best poetry event in the borough” by Brooklyn Magazine and “one of the most innovative literary events in the city” by Time Out New York, the Brooklyn Poets Yawp is a monthly poetry workshop & open mic held on the second Monday of every month from 7 to 9:30 PM. Formerly held at the beloved 61 Local in Cobble Hill, the Yawp is currently being held virtually via Zoom due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

To register for our next Yawp, sign up using the form on this page and wait to be transferred to Eventbrite to purchase your ticket. $10 for the workshop & open mic; $5 for just the open mic. The workshop starts at 7, open mic at 8. Never written a poem before or needing a kick in the pants to start writing again? Join us at 7 and take the workshop. Already writing and itching to test your work on a live audience? Skip the workshop and join us at 8 for the open mic.

Each reader for the open mic gets to read one poem of 3 minutes max. You can sign up in advance through the form on this page for one of twenty reserved spots. If those spots fill, we’ll put you on the wait list.

One poem at every open mic is declared Yawp Poem of the Month by audience vote. The winning writer earns a Brooklyn Poets tote bag, one of the twelve spots in our Yawp Poem of the Year contest and two tickets to at our annual Awards Gala in December. We record and publish a monthly Yawpcast, so note that by reading you’re giving us permission to distribute your recording, unless you notify us otherwise. Also note that by participating in the Yawp, you agree to the terms of our code of conduct. Brooklyn Poets reserves the right to dismiss from our programs any participant found to be in violation of this code. Thank you for respecting our community.

Next Yawp: Mon, June 13, via Zoom
Workshop leader: Cindy Tran

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At Home with Literati: Jennifer Huang, Carlina Duan, Cindy Tran, & Lauren Shapiro
Jan
18

At Home with Literati: Jennifer Huang, Carlina Duan, Cindy Tran, & Lauren Shapiro

We're pleased to welcome Jennifer Huang to our At Home with Literati Series to celebrate the launch of Return Flight. They will be joined by readers Cindy Tran, Carlina Duan, & Lauren Shapiro.

Click here to join the webinar event on 1/18. No pre-registration required!

Note: we are now hosting on Zoom webinars. You will be prompted to enter a first name and email upon joining. You may then see a window reading "waiting for host to start webinar," but sit tight--you will be admitted as soon as we begin broadcasting live! You will be able to submit questions using the Q&A feature.

About the book: Selected by Jos Charles as the winner of the 2021 Ballard Spahr Prize for Poetry, Return Flight is a lush reckoning: with inheritance, with body, with trauma, with desire--and with the many tendons in between.

When Return Flight asks "what name / do you crown yourself," Huang answers with many. Textured with mountains--a folkloric goddess-prison, Yushan, mother, men, self--and peppered with shapeshifting creatures, spirits, and gods, the landscape of Jennifer Huang's poems is at once mystical and fleshy, a "myth a mess of myself." Sensuously, Huang depicts each of these not as things to claim but as topographies to behold and hold.

Here, too, is another kind of mythology. Set to the music of "beating hearts / through objects passed down," the poems travel through generations--among Taiwan, China, and America--cataloging familial wounds and beloved stories. A grandfather's smile shining through rain, baby bok choy in a child's bowl, a slap felt decades later--the result is a map of a present-day life, reflected through the past.

Return Flight is a thrumming debut that teaches us how history harrows and heals, often with the same hand; how touch can mean "purple" and "blue" as much as it means intimacy; and how one might find a path toward joy not by leaving the past in the past, but by "[keeping a] hand on these memories, / to feel them to their ends."

Jennifer Huang was born in Maryland to Taiwanese immigrants and has since called many places her home. Their poems have appeared in POETRY, The Rumpus, and Narrative Magazine, among other places; and they have been received recognition from the Academy of American Poets, Brooklyn Poets, North American Taiwan Studies Association, and more. In 2020, Jennifer earned their MFA in poetry at the University of Michigan Helen Zell Writers' Program. They live in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

Carlina Duan is a writer-educator from Michigan, and the author of the poetry collections I Wore My Blackest Hair (Little A, 2017) and Alien Miss (Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 2021). Her poems have appeared in POETRY Magazine, Narrative Magazine, Poets.org, and more. She currently teaches documentary poetry at the University of Michigan, and is a Ph.D. student in U-M’s Joint Program in English and Education. She is a big fan of fruit, red leaves, and Jennifer's poems.

Cindy Tran is a 2020 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Poetry, author of Sonnet Crown for NYC, and the producer/writer of a short film of the same name commissioned by The Shed. A recipient of fellowships from The Loft Literary Center, Brooklyn Poets, and Asian Women Giving Circle, her work appears in SLICE, the Margins, and Copper Nickel, which awarded her an Editor’s Prize. She lives in New York City.

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Mary Jane Dunphe & Cindy Tran
Oct
18

Mary Jane Dunphe & Cindy Tran

Each poem can be a village and an era, animated by a kind of ferocious closeness. In Mary Jane Dunphe and Cindy Tran’s writing, words vibrate into a chorus of presence, a city of moms, a chant echoing a living mystery.

Featuring a guest introduction by Ladan Osman.

Tickets for this event will become available on Monday, September 27.

More information at The Poetry Project.

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The Shed Open Call - Cindy Tran - Sonnet Crown for NYC
Jun
5

The Shed Open Call - Cindy Tran - Sonnet Crown for NYC

This event will include a screening of Cindy Tran’s film, Sonnet Crown for NYC. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion moderated by poetry editor Nkosi Nkululeko with Tran, the film’s director Xiao Han, and business owners Kit Keys, Yant Studio, Queens; Hind Almashhadani, Almashhadani Services, Staten Island; Ramona Ferreyra, Ojala Threads, the Bronx; and Hank Kwon, Bulletproof Comics, Brooklyn.

Cindy Tran’s film Sonnet Crown for NYC celebrates small business owners of establishments—such as a barbershop, a pharmacy, and an immigration service—throughout the five boroughs. After interviewing these New Yorkers, Tran wrote sonnets that they recited to the camera, capturing their feelings and thoughts about the pandemic that has taken a disproportionate toll on many of their lives and livelihoods. Tran drew inspiration for this film from artistic Yelp reviews she began writing in the form of poems in Minneapolis in 2012, a practice she continued when she moved to New York City in 2015. When one of her poem-reviews responding to a racist review of a Vietnamese restaurant she frequented was chosen as a Review of the Day, she felt inspired to shift her focus from consumer judgments to sincere reflections about the ways our values and beliefs shape our daily lives. The poems that compose the film’s sonnet redoublé, or series of 15 interlaced sonnets, challenge readers to see the people who are often overlooked in the city’s communities—those who feel they have no choice but to keep working in the pandemic to sustain themselves and those that they care for, despite the threat to their own health.

Tickets:
https://theshed.org/program/195-open-call-cindy-tran

This event takes place in The McCourt.

The screening of Sonnet Crown for NYC takes place Saturday, June 5 at 8 pm.

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Our Time Is Now, An evening curated by Jennifer Koh
May
25

Our Time Is Now, An evening curated by Jennifer Koh

Restart Stages

Our Time Is Now

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts

An evening curated by Jennifer Koh
Vijay Iyer, pianist
Cindy Tran, poet
Simone White, poet

The New York Times calls the classical violinist Jennifer Koh “a star… by any measure.” With a career that includes performances with such orchestras as the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the New York Philharmonic and recitals comprising music from the traditional to contemporary—including Alone Together, a new collaborative project encompassing more than forty works donated by established composers and commissioned from the freelance composers they recommended—few artists are as attuned to the disruption the pandemic has inflicted on the recording and live performance world.

For this specially commissioned production, Lincoln Center has asked Ms. Koh to curate a program that speaks to that experience. In response, she has created an hour-long salon that addresses the ongoing trauma borne by New York City’s AAPI and Black communities and their shared response of creative excellence in the face of adversity.

Koh will be joined on stage with poets Cindy Tran and Simone White in a performance that juxtaposes spoken word with the world premieres of four works newly composed for Alone Together by Courtney Bryan, LaTasha Bundy, Ken Ueno, and Amadeus Regucera. The performance is dedicated to George Floyd and all victims of racial discrimination.

Performance Length: Approximately 60 minutes, no intermission

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Apr
1

Brooklyn Poets Staff Picks Reading

Brooklyn Poets Staff Picks is a quarterly reading series curated by the poets who assist with our web, events and office work. Each reading features a lineup of six poets nominated by different staff members as among the most essential new voices today. The series focuses on writers yet to publish a full-length collection of poetry, with an emphasis on Brooklyn-based poets and those from underrepresented communities. All readings are free and open to the public.

Our reading on Thursday, April 1, at 7:30 PM (EDT) features poets Wo Chan, Imani Davis, Bernard Ferguson, Michael Frazier, Angbeen Saleem, and Cindy Tran.

Register at http://bit.ly/bpsp-4121

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Mar
19

Peace Vigil for Victims of Asian Hate

I will be reading “True American Sentences”.

Fellow New Yorkers: Join AAF TOMORROW for a Peace Vigil for Victims of Asian Hate to honor the victims of the Atlanta shootings, recognize the countless lives that have been impacted by anti-Asian violence, and make a call to action for elected leaders and all New Yorkers to ensure greater safety and accountability for vulnerable Asian Americans. #StopAsianHate

📍Union Square (South end by 14th St) — Friday, March 19 at 6pm

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Jun
3

Culture Club NYC 2020: Black Lives Matter

ARTISTS AND PERFORMERS:

Cindy Tran / Elijah Anderson / Jax Perez / Jess Smith / Evan Gill Smith / Zefyr Lisowski / Meagan Washington / Miles Francis / Heather Simon / Farryl Last / Brett Highland / Jen DeGregorio / Jake Pinto / Jen Lue / Eve Kenneally / Kyle Dacuyan / Melody Rabe / + more!

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DONATE:
In lieu of a cover for this event, we ask that you donate at least $5 to Equality For Flatbush.

More information and donation links:
http://www.equalityforflatbush.org/

**After you donate, please send me a screenshot or receipt. Exact totals would be great so we can share the impact we made together after the event!**

Alternatively, you can Venmo me (@suzihigh) your donation, and I'll provide a receipt.

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When Black people are twice as likely to die from Covid-19, yet more resources and money are poured into policing and racist policy than public health, the priorities of those in power are clear.

This year's Culture Club, in memory of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor, is in solidarity with and support of Black people everywhere.

Equality for Flatbush is a people of color-led, multi-national grassroots organization that does anti-police repression, affordable housing and anti-gentrification/anti-displacement organizing in Flatbush, East Flatbush and Brooklyn-wide. Among other campaigns, they're in the midst of Brooklyn Shows Love, a mutual aid project aimed at providing meals and medicinal supplies to local residents. Your donation will help this valuable organization continue to do its work, now and in the future.

We the artists are pissed off. Come join us.

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WATCH:

https://www.facebook.com/shighland/videos/10157316848758034/
(Begins around 1 hr 23; closed caption version will be posted soon)

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Mar
14

Never Give Up

In spirit of Women's History Month, join us in an intimate gathering for a night of expression. We want to explore what it looks like to never give up.

Art can create the change we want to see and feel. When we come together, we are unstoppable.

Hosted by Hello Prosper.

RSVP on Facebook.

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Feb
1

Crush Reading Series #18

Please join us for the eighteenth installment in our reading series of poetry, prose, and miscellaneous text at Woodbine. To find in language the textures of our lives and the sensibilities of our world. For the pleasures of the text, for the pleasures of the voice.

Readers: Valentine Conaty, Suzanne Highland, kamikaze jones, Kimberly Lambright, Cindy Tran, Meagan Washington.

RSVP on Facebook

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Jan
1

The 46th Annual New Year's Day Marathon Reading - The Poetry Project

There are three things to consider when the New Year’s Day Poetry Marathon sweeps you into its gracefully uncouth embrace — what it is, what it was, and who you will be when it’s over. An untamed gathering of the heart’s secret, wild nobility — over 140 poets together revealing not just that a better life could exist, but that it already does, sexy and wise, rancorous and sweet, big hearted and mad as hell. An avenging engine of resistance and eager vehicle of the nascent year.

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Nov
23

Vibe of the Village Festival

I will be reading at 3:15 PM and 5:30 PM.

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Celebrate the creative legacy of The Village Voice (1955-2018), the downtown alternative weekly that "gave New York its cool."

In honor of the one-year anniversary of the pioneering paper's closing, this weekend-long festival features conversations with former Voice writers and photographers, a coffeehouse-style concert with legendary musician David Amram and friends, pop-up musical and spoken-word performances, family activities, and more!

At once a feisty neighborhood newspaper that challenged local politics and the essential chronicler of downtown arts and culture, the Voice helped define the free-wheeling spirit of the Village in the late 1950s, '60s, and '70s (and beyond) while nurturing several generations of influential American journalists, critics, and photographers. Join us to explore what both the late-lamented Voice, and more broadly "the Village," meant and continues to mean to New York's identity as a creative hotbed.

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Aug
21

AAWW Poetry Salon

Catered to kill the bridge between the audience and the reader, TAG-YOU-ARE-NEXT Open Mic focuses on inclusive practice of engagement where one reader ‘tags’ the next one to come forward to read and so on.

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