The 18th Annual Virtual Palm Beach Poetry Festival Workshop Faculty included: Kim Addonizio, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Chard deNiord, Mark Doty, Yona Harvey, John Murillo, Matthew Olzmann, and Diane Seuss. Our Special Guest Poet is Yusef Komunyakaa. Poet-at-Large is Aimee Nezhukumatathil. Individual conference faculty poets are: Lorna Knowles Blake, Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, Jessica Jacobs, and Angela Narciso Torres.

The 18th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place virtually January 10-15, 2022. Old School Square in Delray Beach is undergoing extensive renovations.

The 17th Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place January 18-23, 2021 and was held virtually. Workshop and featured faculty poets included David Baker, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Traci Brimhall, Eduardo C. Corral, Vievee Francis, Kevin Prufer, Martha Rhodes and Tim Seibles; our Special Guest Poet, Gregory Orr, performed in a Palm Beach Poetry Festival film recording of “The Beloved: A Poetry & Song Cycle with The Parkington Sisters (with hats off to the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival for the first filmed version of a live Beloved performance.). Poet At Large Brian Turner joined our Kick-Off Reading roster during festival week and live-streamed his poems to the Palm Beach County Schools in collaboration with the festival for National Poetry Month. Our Conference Faculty Poets Lorna Knowles Blake, Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, Jessica Jacobs, and Angela Narciso Torres also served as presenters for evening readings and gave their own knockout reading to open the festival. Poet Karin de Weille was invited by Founder Miles Coon to present a craft talk with Tim Seibles.

One of the special features of our festival was partnering with Murder on the Beach to create a virtual bookstore and schedule virtual signings by the poets.

The 2020 Workshop Faculty included Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Nickole Brown & Jessica Jacobs, Reginald Gibbons, Major Jackson, Ilya Kaminsky, David Kirby, Dana Levin, Adrian Matejka, and Maggie Smith. Our Special Guest was U.S. Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo; and Patricia Smith, as the festival’s Poet-at-Large visited and performed for students in the Palm Beach County Schools. Conference Faculty included Lorna Blake, Sally Bliumis-Dunn, and Angela Narciso Torres.

Six days and evenings of extraordinary workshops, talks on craft, Q&As, panel discussions, readings, book signings, and social events with our award winning-faculty and special guests.

Beautiful Delray Beach Florida and the enchanting offerings of Atlantic Avenue welcomed poets from over 30 states and abroad for our annual gathering of a growing community of poets that includes experts, peers, and lovers of poetry where Poetry is the Conversation …

The 15th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place January 21-26, 2019. Faculty included: Ellen Bass, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Stuart Dischell, Aracelis Girmay, Campbell McGrath, Gregory Pardlo, Matthew Olzmann, Chase Twichell, Eleanor Wilner, Lorna Blake, Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown and Stephen Gibson. Special Guest: Sharon Olds, and Poet-At-Large, Tyehimba Jess. Nickole Brown and Jessica Jacobs co-taught a workshop. Attending festival events offered several opportunities to be inspired by some of America’s most engaging and award-winning poets.

The 14th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival, January 15-20, 2018, Delray Beach, Florida was presented in loving memory of Thomas Lux. 2018 Workshop Faculty included: Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Chard deNiord, Beth Ann Fennelly, Ross Gay, Rodney Jones, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Tim Seibles. Our Special Guest, poet Coleman Barks, was interviewed by Chard deNiord and featured at the Annual Gala Reading. Performance Poets were Elizabeth Acevedo and Aja Monet, and the Conference Faculty were Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, and Lorna Knowles Blake.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 13th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place in Delray Beach, Florida, January 16-21, 2017, and participants enjoyed six days of extraordinary poetry events: workshops, readings, talks on the craft of writing poems, manuscript conferences, panel discussion, social events and so much more in beautiful downtown Delray Beach, Florida.

Faculty poets included: David Baker, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Tina Chang, Lynn Emanuel, Daisy Fried, Terrance Hayes, Dorianne Laux, Carl Phillips, and Martha Rhodes. Our Special Guest was Charles Simic, past U.S. Poet Laureate, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Griffin Poetry Prize, and MacArthur “genius award.” Performance poets were The Mayhem Poets, Mason Granger and Scott Raven, and Individual Conference Faculty include Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, and Ginger Murchison.

2017 Workshops

POETRY INSIDE OUT with DAVID BAKER

THE SENSUAL FORM with TINA CHANG

OBSESSIONAL POETICS: NO ONE WRITES JUST ONE FORM with LYNN EMANUEL

WRITING POEMS THT DON’T FIT with DAISY FRIED

NEW SHADOWS: READING TO WRITE with TERRANCE HAYES

THE POET’S CRAFT: USING WHAT’S AT HAND with DORIANNE LAUX

WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE with THOMAS LUX

MAKING POEMS FROM THE WAY POEMS WORK with CARL PHILLIPS

ESTABLISHING, SUSTAINING & SHIFTING POETIC TONE: REVISION with MARTHA RHODES

 

The 12th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place January 18-23, 2016 at Delray Beach Center for the Arts in beautiful downtown Delray Beach, Florida. Six days and evenings of extraordinary poetry events featured workshops, readings, craft talks, interviews and panel discussions, workshops and more.

The 2016 workshop faculty included: Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Carl Dennis, Denise Duhamel, Carol Frost, Thomas Lux, Tom Sleigh, Mary Szybist, and Kevin Young. Special Guest is Robert Hass, and coffee house headliners, Dominique Christina and Mark Kelly Smith, who visited, taught and presented in Palm Beach County High Schools. Conference Faculty were Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, and Ginger Murchison.

2016 Workshops included:

Carl Dennis: IT’S YOUR WORK: RECENT POEMS & GENERATING POEMS
Laure-Anne Bosselaar: WAIT… LET ME REPHRASE THIS
Thomas Lux: WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE
Tom Sleigh: NEW THRESHOLDS, NEW ANATOMIES!
Mary Szybist: UNSETTLING AND REMAKING
Kevin Young: THE HUNGRY EAR: POEMS OF FOOD, DRINK & DESIRE
Denise Duhamel: LAYING THE FOUNDATION: CONCRETE IMAGERY IN POETRY
Carol Frost: RIVERS THE LIKE SOUL MY GROWN HAS DEEP
Alan Shapiro: REVISION: OPPORTUNITY FOR DISCOVERY AND SURPRISE

2016 Craft Talks included:

Laure-Anne Bosselaar: Conveying Emotion through Imagery, Address, Personification and Pathetic Fallacy
(A Close Read of “Two Trees” by Larry Levis)
Carl Dennis: Four Virtues
Denise Duhamel: It Takes Two: Collaborative Poetry
Carol Frost:  The Imperative in ‘The Emperor of Ice Cream”
Thomas Lux:  Two Sonnets by Bill Knott
Tom Sleigh:  From the Top Down and From Side to Side: Line/Syntax/Stanza
Mary Szybist: Repetition and Resonance
Kevin Young: Throw Your Voice

The 11th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held January 19-24, 2015. Our faculty included Chard deNiord, Linda Gregerson, Thomas Lux, Maurice Manning, Molly Peacock, Brenda Shaughnessy, Patricia Smith, and Robert Wrigley. We presented six days of reading events, interviews, craft lectures, and, of course, poetry workshops. Malcolm London and Rachel McKibbens headlined the annual coffee house and performed for local high school audiences. Additional conference faculty Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Nickole Brown, and Ginger Murchison taught one-on-one conferences. Our special guest poet was Dana Gioia, poet, essayist, critic and former Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts (2003-2009). The phrase we chose to represent this festival was, “Poetry Is Alive.

A special event, “Ballet’s Child,” inspired by the poems of Lani Scozzari with choreography by Donna Goffredo Murray was presented on Friday night. See the trailer for this beautiful and moving collaborative performance.

2015 Workshops

Chard deNiord: ALL THINGS COUNTER, ORIGINAL, SPARE, STRANGE
Linda Gregerson: POETIC ‘YIELD’ with LINDA GREGERSON
Thomas Lux: WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE
Maurice Manning: LISTEN TO THIS: SOUND & STRUCTURE IN WRITING POEMS
Molly Peacock: THE RIB CAGE OF THE POEM: WRITING FORM FROM THE INSIDE OUT
Brenda Shaughnessy: NAMING THE NAMELESS
Patricia Smith: STRAINING THE BORDERS
Robert Wrigley: TO DELIGHT, TO INSTRUCT, AND TO WOUND

2015 Craft Talks

Chard deNiord: Like A Book At Evening: Truth & The Imagination
Linda Gregerson: Marianne Moore & The Zipper
Thomas Lux : The Epistolary Poem, Famous Examples
Maurice Manning: Loaded Lines
Molly Peacock: Snap! A Sonnet
Brenda Shaughnessy: Learning To See: The Craft Of Lived Experience (In Plath, Oliver & Orr)
Patricia Smith: Initiating The Squirm: Writing The Poems That Changed My Life
Robert Wrigley: He Who/She Who Listens, But Does Not Speak

The 10th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held in Delray Beach at Delray Beach Center for the Arts, January 18-24, 2014. Participants enjoyed six days of readings, lectures, craft talks, and poetry workshops. The workshop faculty included: Nick Flynn, Carolyn Forche,  Linda Gregg, Thomas Lux, Campbell McGrath, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Mary Ruefle, and Tim Seibles.  Our Special Guest Poet Natasha Tretheway (United States Poet Laureate 2012-2014) presented the 10th Anniversary Gala Reading, Taylor Mali and Glenis Redmond served as the festival’s performance poets, and Sally Bliumis-Dunn, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Traci Brimhall, Ginger Murchison, and Chard deNiord were the festival’s additional featured poets.

 

2013 WORKSHOPS

Nick Flynn, POETRY AS BEWILDERMENT

Carolyn Forche, CREATE AND CRITIQUE

Linda Gregg, CRAFT OF THE INVISIBLE

Thomas Lux, WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE

Campbell McGrath, PEELING THE ONION: REVEALING THE LYRIC VOICE

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, BRINGING THE OUTSIDE IN

Mary Ruefle, THE POEM ON THE TABLE

Tim Seibles, IT’S ALL IN THE DETAILS

2013 CRAFT TALKS

Nick Flynn, On Collaboration: How to Rattle the Cage of Ego

Carolyn Forche, Poetry and Time: The Art of Temporal Space

Linda Gregg, The Craft of the Invisible

Thomas Lux, The Reason for Rhyme in Berryman’s Dream Songs

Campbell McGrath, Finding the Source: Poetic Inspiration and Subject Matter

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Landscapes & Light: Poetry and the Natural World

Mary Ruefle, On Erasure: Visual and Textual

Tim Seibles, A Seduction: Metaphor and the Come Hither

 

The 9th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place January 21-26, 2013 at Delray Beach Center for the Arts in beautiful downtown Delray Beach, Florida. January 21-26, 2013. Six days and evenings of extraordinary poetry events featured workshops, readings, craft talks, interviews, panel discussions and more.

The 2013 workshop faculty included: B.H. Fairchild, Terrance Hayes, Jane Hirshfield, Tony Hoagland, Laura Kasischke, Thomas Lux, Lisa Russ Spaar, and Tracy K. Smith. Conference faculty this year were: Nickole Browne, Sally Bliumis Dunn, and Ginger Murchison.  Billy Collins was the Gala Reading’s Special Guest, and Marty McConnell & Rives were the festival’s performance poets.

2013 Workshops

B.H. Fairchild, CRAFT MASTERY

Terrance Hayes, NEW SHADOWS; MOVING POEMS FROM IMITATION TO INNOVATION

Jane Hirshfield, ENLARGING POEMS

Tony Hoagland, A WORKSHOP ON LAYERING

Laura Kasischke, THE POEM THAT WRITERS ITSELF

Tracy K. Smith, SOMETHING PATTERNED, WILD AND FREE

Lisa Russ Spaar, “GEM TACTICS:” DEPLOYING ECSTATIC RUSES IN POEMS OF ARDOR

Thomas Lux, WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE

2013 Craft Talks

Tracy K. Smith, Rainbow, Rainbow!: Empathy and the Image

Tony Hoagland, This Blood Is Wet Again: Reaching Poetic Intensity

Jane Hirshfield, Poetry Is a Kind of Lying, or, Tell All the Truth but Tell It Slant

Thomas Lux, Nuts and Bolts: a refresher on meter, scansion, and meter making argument

Terrance Hayes, Ideas of Ancestry

Laura Kasischke, Poetry & Mystery: When Less Is More

B.H. Fairchild, Narrative Poetry and the Motions of Being

Lisa Russ Spaar, “Who Dat?”–The Conundrum of “Others” for the Lyric Self

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 8th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held from January 16-21, 2012, in Delray Beach. The faculty poets were Kim Addonizio, Cornelius Eady, Claudia Emerson, David Kirby, Thomas Lux, Gregory Orr, Chase Twichell, and Eleanor Wilner. The festival featured Special Guest Charles Wright, Pultizer Prize and National Book Award winner. Vanessa Hidary and Jamaal May were this year’s performance poets. Additional conference faculty included Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Kurt Brown, and Ginger Murchison.

2012 Workshops

THE SHIMMER: METAPHOR IN THE MACHINE OF WORDS with KIM ADDONIZIO

THE ART OF THE DRAFT; READING THE POET’S PALM with CORNELIUS EADY

MOTHER OF MUSES — POETRY AND MEMORY with CLAUDIA EMERSON

THREE-DIMENSIONAL POETRY with DAVID KIRBY

WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE with THOMAS LUX

WRITING FROM YOUR THRESHOLD with GREGORY ORR

SIDEWAYS AND BACKWARDS: FINDING THE POEM’S STRUCTURE with CHASE TWICHELL

NIGHT FISHING IN THE SOUND: INVITATIONS TO THE IMAGINATION with ELEANOR WILNER

 

 

The 7th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival took place January 17-22, 2011 at Old School Square in Delray Beach. 2011 Faculty included Stuart Dischell, Jane Hirsfield, Thomas Lux, Heather McHugh, Vijay Seshadri, Alan Shapiro, Ellen Bryant Voigt, and C.D. Wright. Special Guest Reader was former US Poet Laureate, Robert Pinsky. The Performance Poets were David Blair and Taylor Mali. Participants from over 30 states, U.K., British Columbia and the Bahamas attended the festival. Two public events sold out, including Robert Pinsky’s reading where he mesmerized the audience as he performed his poems with the Paul Tardiff Jazz Trio. The Festival also sponsored, The Image, Poetry and Photography, an exhibition of photographs inspired by lines from the poems of the featured festival poets.

2011 Workshops

NOW LOOK WHAT YOU HAVE DONE with STUART DISCHELL

ENLARGING POEMS with JANE HIRSHFIELD

WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE with THOMAS LUX

AN ARCHITECTURE OF SENSES with HEATHER MCHUGH

THE PLOT OF THE POEM with VIJAY SESHADRI

THE CRAFT OF POETRY with ELLEN BRYANT VOIGT

WRITING AT THE EDGE OF THINGS with CD WRIGHT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 6th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held at Old School Square in Delray Beach, Florida, January 18-23, 2010. The poets who taught Advanced Workshops included: Stephen Dobyns, Carolyn Forche, Marie Howe, Thomas Lux, David Wojahn, and Kevin Young. Mary Cornish and Ilya Kaminsky facilitated the Intermediate Workshops. Other Featured Readers were Jay Hopler, Sidney Wade, Andrea Gibson, and Anis Mojgani.

2010 Advanced Workshops

THE POEM’S INTENTION with STEPHEN DOBYNS

ONE POETRY: TOWARD NEW POEMS with CAROLYN FORCHE

WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE with THOMAS LUX

TAKING RISKS with JEAN VALENTINE

THE WRITING OF POETRY: ENHANCED TECHNIQUES with DAVID WOJAHN

POEMS OF PRAISE with KEVIN YOUNG

2010 Intermediate Workshops

SEEING AND SAYING/POETRY AND THE VISUAL IMAGE with MARY CORNISH

MASTERS AS MODELS with ILYA KAMINSKY

 

 

 

 

 

The 5th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held January 19-24, 2009, at the Old School Square Cultural Arts Center in Delray Beach. Faculty poets featured at the 2009 Festival were: Denise Duhamel, Martin Espada, Kimiko Hahn, Laura Kasischke, Thomas Lux, Ann Marie Macari, Gregory Orr, Victoria Redel, and Gerald Stern. Additional guest poets who were featured readers at the festival were: Kelle Groom, Michael Hettich, Taylor Mali, and Lynn Procope.

2009 Advanced Workshops

BARBARIC YAWP with MARTIN ESPADA

RE-VISITING POEMS with KIMIKO HAHN

THE POEM THAT WRITES ITSELF with LAURA KASISCHKE

WORD BY WORD, LINE BY LINE with THOMAS LUX

GOING TO THE NEXT LEVEL with Anne Marie MACARI AND GERALD STERN

WRITING FROM YOUR THRESHOLD with GREGORY ORR

2009 Intermediate Workshops

FEAR, MEMORY,  AND DESIRE with DENISE DUHAMEL

GENERATING NEW WORK with VICTORIA REDEL

The 4th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held from January 21-26, 2008, at the Old School Square Cultural Arts Center in Delray Beach. Featured poets were: Kim Addonizio, Roger Bonair-Agard, Claudia Emerson, Lola Haskins, Major Jackson, Thomas Lux, Marty McConnell, Campbell McGrath, Malena Morling, Sharon Olds, Spencer Reece, and C.K. Williams.

2008 Advanced Workshops
Stealing Fire with Kim Addonizio; Delight to Wisdom with Claudia Emerson; Word by Word, Line by Line with Thomas Lux; Poetry Is Priceless with Campbell McGrath; Generating New Work with Sharon Olds; and Re-conceiving Poems with C.K. Williams

2008 Intermediate Workshops
Music Makes It Happen with Major Jackson and Transforming Poems with Malena Morling

Florida Poets were Lola Haskins and Spencer Reece; Coffee House Performance Poets were Roger Bonair-Agard and Marty McConnell

 

 

The 3rd Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival was held from January 24-27, 2007, at the Old School Square Cultural Arts Center in Delray Beach, Florida. The poets featured at the 3rd Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival were: Mark Doty, Stephen Dunn, Barbara Hamby, David Kirby, Dorianne Laux, Thomas Lux, Jeffrey McDaniel, Heather McHugh, Alan Shapiro, Patricia Smith, Quincy Troupe, and Ellen Bryant Voigt.

The 2nd Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival, presented in partnership with Old School Square, Delray Beach, took place January 19-22, 2006.

Workshop Faculty included:

Advanced Workshops:
Tony Hoagland, Jane Hirshfield, Galway Kinnell, Thomas Lux, Marilyn Nelson, Sharon Olds and

Intermediate Workshops:
Laure-Anne Bosselaar, and Kurt Brown.

The Florida Poets Reading featured Susan Mitchell and Campbell McGrath.

PBPF_2006_Flyer (pdf)

 

The 1st Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival, January 21-23, 2005, was presented at Lynn University, Boca Raton, Florida, in partnership with Poets of the Palm Beaches, Inc. and directed by Miles Coon. The 2005 workshop faculty included Billy Collins, Thomas Lux, Sharon Olds and Patricia Smith. Additional featured poets included Mary Cornish and Karin deWeille.