City of Chesapeake

Chesapeake Public Library System

Russell Memorial Library
2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23321-2210
Telephone (757) 410-7016
FAX (757) 410-7029

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE…………………………….…………………….…May 1, 2010

Contact: Margaret D. Stone, Information Specialist

Russell Memorial Library, 2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, VA 23321 (757) 410-7016

18th Annual Chesapeake Poetry Festival

It’s spring and that means it’s time for the 18th Annual Chesapeake Poetry Festival! It

will be held at Russell Memorial Library, 2808 Taylor Road, in the Western Branch section of

Chesapeake on May 14 and 15, 2010. All events are free and open to the public. Both

programs begin at 7:00 PM.

Chesapeake Poetry Festival events include:

May 14: “Evening with the Poets” –Tim Seibles and Jon Pineda
Host: C. Edward Russell, Jr.

May 15: Adult Open Mike Night

Host: Billie Montgomery/Cook

Highlighting the festival is Friday night’s “Evening with the Poets” event hosted by C.

Edward Russell and featuring nationally recognized poets Tim Seibles and Jon Pineda. Both of

these outstanding poets will read selected original poetry. Come listen to these poets read from

their works on Friday, May 14, at 7:00 PM. Prince Books will have copies of the poets’ books

available for sale and for the poets to autograph.

Open Mic Night, hosted by Portsmouth’s own Billie Montgomery/Cook, will be on

Saturday, May 15, at 7:00 pm. This event is when local amateur and professional poets can

step up to the microphone and share their favorite original works, appropriate for a family

audience. This event is open to adults and does not require advance registration.

“The City of Chesapeake adheres to the principles of equal employment opportunity.

This policy extends to all programs and services supported by the City”
 City of Chesapeake

Chesapeake Public Library System

Russell Memorial Library
2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23321-2210
Telephone (757) 410-7016
FAX (757) 410-7029

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Chesapeake Poetry Festival

Host Billie Montgomery/Cook is a local writer and historian based in

Portsmouth, VA. She is the author of two books, Georgiana Scott: A Free Child of

Portsmouth, the first in a trilogy of historical fiction novels (P-TOWN Books

Publishing) and The Real Deal: A Spiritual Guide for Black Teen Girls (Judson Press).

She has served as host of the Chesapeake Poetry Festival's Adult Open Mike Night

for several years. Open Mic Night is always fun for everyone. Come share your poetry or

come listen to others read.

About the poets:

Tim Seibles is an extraordinary poet and dynamic reader. He has been honored

with many grants and awards, including an Open Voice Award and fellowships from the National

Endowment for the Arts and the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center.

Mr. Seibles is the author of five books of poetry, most recently Buffalo Head Solos

(Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2004). His first book, Body Moves (Corona Press,

1988) was followed by Hurdy Gurdy (Cleveland State, 1992), Kerosene (Ampersand Press,

1995), Hammerlock (1999). He has received fellowships from the Provincetown Fine Arts Work

Center and the NEA, and recently won an Open Voice Award from the National Writers' Voice

Project. One of his poems, Allison Wolff, was selected for inclusion in the Best Poetry

of 2010 , an annual collection which features poets from across the country and

across the aesthetic spectrum.

“The City of Chesapeake adheres to the principles of equal employment opportunity.

This policy extends to all programs and services supported by the City”
 City of Chesapeake

Chesapeake Public Library System

Russell Memorial Library
2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23321-2210
Telephone (757) 410-7016
FAX (757) 410-7029

In addition to his five books of poetry, Mr. Seibles’s poems have appeared widely in

journals such as Ploughshares, New England Review, The Artful Dodge, The Kenyon Review,

Chesapeake Poetry Festival

Page 3

Red Brick Review, and Black American Literary Forum, as well as in the anthologies Outsiders,

Verse and Universe, In Search of Color Everywhere, A Way Out of No Way, New American

Poets in the 90’s, Black Nature , Seriously Funny , and So Much Things to Say , which

originates in Jamaica and features poets who've been guests at the Calabash

Festival in Treasure Beach, Jamaica.

Born in Philadelphia in 1955 to a high school English teacher and a biochemist for the

Department of Agriculture, Mr. Seible’s love for Greek and Roman mythology and dreams of

writing science fiction novels were balanced by a driving ambition to become a professional

football player. Drawn to Southern Methodist University for football, he found his way to poetry

there as an undergraduate. After a decade in Dallas teaching high school English, he earned a

Masters in Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Vermont College.

Mr. Seibles’s streetwise, syncopated poems zero in on such wide-ranging subjects as

basketball, sex, dogs, race, and the inner thoughts of cartoon characters. Of his poetry, poet

and popular novelist Sandra Cisneros says, “This is not the poetry of a highfalutin’ violin nor the

somber cello, but a melody you heard somewhere that followed you home.”

Mr. Seibles lives in eastern Virginia, where he teaches in the M.F.A. Program at Old

Dominion University. He is the Poet-in-Residence at Bucknell University in Pennsylvania.

Jon Pineda is the recipient of a Virginia Commission for the Arts Individual Artist

“The City of Chesapeake adheres to the principles of equal employment opportunity.

This policy extends to all programs and services supported by the City”
 City of Chesapeake

Chesapeake Public Library System

Russell Memorial Library
2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23321-2210
Telephone (757) 410-7016
FAX (757) 410-7029

Fellowship and an Associated Writing Programs' Intro award. His works have appeared in

numerous journals including Blackbird, Crab Orchard Review, Poetry Northwest, and

Page 4
Chesapeake Poetry Festival

elsewhere. His poetry has been anthologized in Contemporary Voices from the Eastern World:

an Anthology of Poems (W. W. Norton, 2008), Asian American Poetry: the Next Generation

(University of Illinois Press, 2004), and several other anthologies. Mr. Pineda is the editor of

FONT: a Journal of Poetry, a literary journal featuring poetry by Chesapeake high school

students, grades 10-12. For his work with area teen poets, Mr. Pineda won the Virginian-Pilot

2008 Clippie Community Service Award.

Mr. Pineda has authored two books of poetry: Birthmark (Southern Illinois University

Press), winner of the 2003 Crab Orchard Award Series Open Competition, and The Translator’s

Diary (New Issues Poetry and Prose), winner of the 2007 Green Rose Prize for Poetry. His

third collection, Little Anodynes, has been a finalist for the Akron Poetry Prize, the FIELD Poetry

Prize, and the Benjamin Saltman Award. His memoir, Sleep in Me, is due out this September

from the University of Nebraska Press.

Mr. Pineda has hosted the Chesapeake Poetry Festival’s Teen Open Mic Night and has

participated as a guest reader at the Virginia Festival of the Book, the Fall for the Book Festival,

and as a featured reader at Franklin & Marshall College, James Madison University, New York

University, Randolph Macon Women’s College, Southern Illinois University, among others.

Mr. Pineda currently teaches in the M.F.A. program in Creative Writing at Queens

University in Charlotte, N.C., and is on faculty at the Tinker Mountain Writers Workshop, held at

Hollins University.
“The City of Chesapeake adheres to the principles of equal employment opportunity.
This policy extends to all programs and services supported by the City”
 City of Chesapeake

Chesapeake Public Library System

Russell Memorial Library
2808 Taylor Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23321-2210
Telephone (757) 410-7016
FAX (757) 410-7029

Page 5
Chesapeake Poetry Festival

About the Chesapeake Poetry Festival:

Beginning in 1995, Mr. Russell contributed funds for the establishment of the Dave

Smith Poetry Collection at Russell Memorial Library. This collection honors the memory of Mr.

Russell’s close friend, the late John W. Speers and their mutual friend Dave Smith, former Poet

Laureate of Portsmouth. With an initial donation of $1,000, Russell Memorial Library built a core

collection of anthologies which help students and writers interpret poetry, improve their own

writing, and gain an appreciation of poetry being created now. Mr. Russell has pledged an

annual donation to continue building this special collection. Through the establishment of the

Dave Smith Collection, Russell Memorial Library provides the community with one of the most

comprehensive poetry collections in the area.

Russell Memorial Library Manager Jean Carideo says, “Although a good poet gives

something different to each person, they also unite communities. People arrive at the Poetry

Festival with separate expectations and experience the poetry in different ways. Yet, when they

leave, they leave together.”

All Chesapeake Poetry Festival programs are free and begin at 7:00 PM. Persons with

disabilities are encouraged to participate in any program offered by the Chesapeake Public

Library. For more information contact the Chesapeake Public Library at 410-7016 or visit our

website at www.infopeake.org .

//end//

“The City of Chesapeake adheres to the principles of equal employment opportunity.

This policy extends to all programs and services supported by the City”