Second Sunday Readings

Diane Lee Moomey has lived and wandered around the US and Canada and now lives in Half Moon Bay, California, where she co-hosts a monthly series, “Coastside Poetry.” She has also taught Poetry Appreciation to older adults through Foothill College’s Disability Resource Program. A regular reader at San Francisco Bay Area poetry venues, Diane has published work in The MacGuffin, Light, THINK, Mezzo Cammin, MacQueen’s Quinterly and others, and been nominated for three Pushcart prizes. She is also the author of four poetry collections -- the most recent is Make For Higher Ground. Diane is also a watercolorist and collage artist, an experience that both seeds and is seeded by her poetic imagery. Visit her at www.dianeleemoomeyart.com      

Prartho Sereno’s 4 prizewinning poetry collections include Indian Rope Trick, Elephant Raga, Call from Paris, and her illustrated Causing a Stir: The Secret Lives and Loves of Kitchen Utensils. Poet Laureate Emerita of Marin County (2015-17), MFA Syracuse University (2013), and Radio Disney Super Teacher (2005), she was a Poet in the Schools for 21 years and currently teaches The Poetic Pilgrimage: Poem-Making as Spiritual Practice online. Prartho holds over four years in an Indian ashram as her strongest creative influence, but she also credits excursions into other art forms: counseling psychologist, vegetarian cook, mother of 2, meditation and yoga instructor at Cornell University, book and cover illustrator, and amateur singer-songwriter. In January 2022, she was named Artist of the Month by the Pt. Reyes Dance Palace, which celebrated her with a virtual show, “Poems & Paint in Conversation,” pairing Prartho’s watercolor paintings with recitations of simpatico poems. https://www.prarthosereno.com 

Ki Coggin is the author of four poetry collections, most recently Mining for Stardust and INCANDESCENT. She is a queer woman of color who thinks Black Lives Matter, a teaching artist in poetry with the Arkansas Arts Council and Arkansas Learning Through the Arts, and the host of the longest running consecutive weekly open mic series in the country—Wednesday Night Poetry. Recently awarded the 2021 Governor’s Arts Award and named “Best Poet in Arkansas” by the Arkansas Times, her fierce and powerful poetry has been nominated four times for The Pushcart Prize, as well as Bettering American Poetry 2015, and Best of the Net 2016 and 2018. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in POETRY, Cultural Weekly, SOLSTICE, Bellevue Literary Review, TAB, Entropy, SWWIM, Split This Rock, Sinister Wisdom, Lavender Review, Tupelo Press, West Trestle Review, and elsewhere. Coggin is Associate Editor at The Rise Up Review. She lives with her wife and their two adorable dogs in the valley of a small mountain in Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas. 

Dion O'Reilly’s debut book, Ghost Dogs, (Terrapin 2020) was shortlisted for several prizes including The Catamaran Prize and The Eric Hoffer Award. Her work appears in such journals as The Sun, Rattle, Cincinnati Review, Narrative, New Letters, American Journal of Poetry, and The New Ohio Review. With The Hive Poetry Collective, she produces podcasts, radio shows, and events. She also leads private workshops with small groups of poets from all over the United States and Canada (dionoreilly.wordpress.com).

Jordan E. Franklin is a poet from Brooklyn, NY. She earned her MFA from Stony Brook Southampton. Her work has appeared in the Southampton Review, Breadcrumbs, easy paradise, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Frontier, and elsewhere. She is the winner of the 2017 James Hearst Poetry Prize and the 2020 Gatewood Prize as well as a finalist of the 2019 Furious Flower Poetry Prize. Her first poetry collection, when the signals come home, was published by Switchback Books in March 2021. Her first poetry chapbook, boys in the electric age, was published by Tolsun Books in August 2021.

Sage Ravenwood is a deaf Cherokee woman residing in upstate NY. She is an outspoken advocate against animal cruelty and domestic violence. Her work can be found in Contrary, Pittsburgh Poetry Journal, Pioneertown Literary, Grain, The Rumpus, Lit Quarterly, Massachusetts Review, Savant-Garde, ANMLY (Anomaly), River Mouth Review, and more.

Susan Clare Bonetto was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, put herself through college and graduate school, and became a highly respected human resources professional who worked for the United Nations as well as companies like Schwab and Williams Sonoma. She, in the words of Thoreau, “lived the life she had imagined,” creating homes for herself and her loved ones in Argentina, Fiji, and San Francisco. She wrote short stories about her time in the South Pacific, which are published in journals and collected in a book called Living Barefoot. Susan lost her battle with lymphoma last fall, leaving her partner, Ken Haas, and a son, Alejandro, who is currently getting his marketing degree at the University of San Diego. Susan was beautiful, wonderful, amazing, courageous, life-affirming, and so much fun. Everyone loved her and she was everyone’s friend. This reading is held in her honor.

Barb Reynolds was the founder of Second Sunday Poetry Series. She holds a master’s degree in clinical psychology and spent 22 years as an emergency response child abuse investigator. Barb’s first chapbook, Boxing Without Gloves (Finishing Line Press), was shortlisted for the 2015 Rubery International First Book Award. During COVID seclusion Barb published the trilogy Isolation Journal, Vol’s 1-3 (bookbaby.com), and her latest chapbook Drawing Words (Finishing Line Press) was released last October. Barb is a Pushcart Prize nominee, and she divides her time between Los Angeles and Provincetown, MA.  barbreynolds.com  

Janet Jennings’ poetry and flash fiction have appeared in Agni Online, Baltimore Review, Nimrod, Shenandoah, and Verse Daily, among others. She is the author of Traces in Water, a poetry chapbook and lives in San Anselmo, California with her husband and twin daughters.

Siân Killingsworth has been published in Blue Earth Review, Typehouse Literary Journal, Stonecoast Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry (Poets Resist), and other journals and anthologies. She is the Anthology Editor for the Marin Poetry Center and Curator for the Second Sunday Poetry Series. Find her on Twitter: @sianessa and @2ndSundayPoetry.

Amanda Moore, whose debut poetry collection Requeening (Ecco, 2021) was selected for the National Poetry Series by Ocean Vuong, is a poet and essayist whose work has appeared in journals and anthologies such as ZZYZVA, Catapult, and Best New Poets. Poetry Editor for Women's Voices for Change and a reader at Bull City Press and VIDA Lit, Amanda is a high school teacher and avid ocean swimmer and surfer. She lives in the Outer Sunset neighborhood of San Francisco. 

Ken Haas lives in San Francisco where he works in healthcare and sponsors a poetry writing program at the UCSF Children's Hospital. Ken’s poems have appeared in over 50 journals and numerous anthologies. His first full poetry collection, Borrowed Light, praised by Joe Millar and Ellen Bass, won the 2020 Red Mountain Press Discovery Award, won a 2021 prize from the National Federation of Press Women, and was shortlisted for the 2021 Rubery Book Award. Ken has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, has won the Betsy Colquitt Poetry Award, and has participated several times in the Community of Writers, on whose Board of Directors he currently serves. Please visit him online at http://kenhaas.org.

In 1979, Barbara Berman organized one of the first Independent Press Festivals in the country in Washington, DC. Her poetry and prose have appeared in The VillageVoice, The Washington Post, Gargoyle, Lilith, Narrative Northeast and other publications. She is the author of a poetry chapbook, THE GENEROSITY OF STARS, from Finishing Line Press, and CURRENTS, a full-length collection of poetry from Three Mile Harbor Press. She has lived in San Francisco for 34 years, with her husband, Clifford Lee, an environmental lawyer. Her books can be purchased at Small Press Distribution-SPD. For signed copies, contact her directly [email protected]

Claire Blotter writes & performs poetry with movement & body percussion. She represented San Francisco in National Poetry Slams in Boston and Chicago. Her poetry has appeared in Rattle, Spillway, Plant-Human Quarterly, California Fire & Water: A Climate Crisis Anthology, amongother journals and anthologies, & in 3 chapbooks. She was a finalist for the Fischer Prize and judged the 2019 competition. She has taught writing at S.F. State University, John F. Kennedy University, Dominican University & College of Marin. She teaches poetry writing to children and teens through the California Poets in the Schools & Poetry Out Loud Programs.

Linda Michel-Cassidy's writing appears or is upcoming in Rattle, Painted Bride, No Tokens, Catapult, The Tahoma Review, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. She is a senior reviews editor at Tupelo Quarterly, a board member at The Marin Poetry Center, and a contributing editor at Entropy. Michel-Cassidy holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars and another, in visual arts, from the California College of the Arts. She is working on two poetrychapbooks and a poetry/image installation to be shown at the Army Corps of Engineers Bay Model. She lives on a houseboat in Sausalito, CA. More at:lmichelcassidy.com

Kate Peper loves to paint watercolors, garden, and walk with her husband and semi-feral dog, Hannah, in Northern California. She’s a five-time Pushcart nominee and her poems can be found in The American Journal of Poetry, Baltimore Review, Cimarron Review, Potomac Review, Rattle, Tar River Review, and others. Her chapbook, Dipped In Black Water, won the New Women's Voices Award from Finishing Line Press, 2016. 

Buy Kate’s chapbook https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/dipped-in-black-water-by-kate-peper/

Erin Rodoni is the author of three poetry collections, most recently And if the Woods Carry You, winner the 2020 Southern Indiana Review Michael Waters Poetry Prize. Her poems have appeared in Poetry Northwest, Blackbird, Cimarron Review, Best New Poets, and Fairy Tale Review, among others. Her honors include The Montreal International Poetry Prize, a Ninth Letter Literary Award, and an AWP Intro Journals Award. She teaches at the Writing Salon, oversees the High School Poetry Contest and Anthology for the Marin Poetry Center, and raises two small humans. 

Buy Erin’s book https://www.usi.edu/sir/sir-press-authors/erin-rodoni/

Danusha Laméris is the author of The Moons of August (Autumn House, 2014), which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye as the winner of the Autumn House Press poetry prize and was a finalist for the Milt Kessler Book Award. Some of her poems have been published in: The Best American Poetry, The New York Times, The American Poetry Review, Prairie Schooner, The SUN Magazine, Tin House, The Gettysburg Review, and Ploughshares. Her second book, Bonfire Opera, (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020), was a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize, and winner of a 2021 Northern California Book Award. The 2020 recipient of the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award, she teaches poetry independently, and is a Poet Laureate emeritus of Santa Cruz County, California. She is currently on the faculty of Pacific University's low-residency MFA program. 

Buy Danusha’s book https://upittpress.org/books/9780822966050/

Judy Juanita's poetry collection, Manhattan my ass, you're in Oakland, won the American Book Award 2021 from the Before Columbus Foundation. Her poem "Bling" was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2012. Her semi-autobiographical novel, Virgin Soul, about a young woman who joins the Black Panther Party in the 60s was published by Viking in 2013. Her collection of essays, DeFacto Feminism: Essays Straight Outta Oakland was published in 2016. Her essay, "The Gun as Performance Poem," was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2014. Her 20+ plays have been produced in the Bay Area, L.A. and NYC. Her short story collection The High Price of Freeways, won the Tartt Fiction Prize 2021 and will be published by Livingston Press in 2022. A former Poet-in-the-Schools in New Jersey, she teaches writing at Laney College in Oakland.

Tureeda Mikell, Story Medicine Woman, poet, writer educator, founder of, Tree of Life Foundation Health Literacy Project. She has been a CA Poets in the Schools instructor since 1989. She has published over 70 classroom student anthologies, and is a U. C. B. Summer Fellow.  a Chi Gong Therapist, named activist for holism, has traveled or Zoomed her way across five continents performing poetry from Egypt to China. She has performed at Museum of the African Diaspora, Yerba Buena Gardens, American Academy of Poets, The Marsh, Freight & Salvage, The De Young Museum, and the Grand Lake Theater where she opened for Saul Williams. Mikell was Nominated for Oakland Poet Laureate. Her book, Synchronicity: The Oracle of Sun Medicine, released in 2020, has sold out for the third time, was nominated for the California book Award. She is also co-curator of, The Patrice Lumumba Anthology, 2021, both available by Nomadic Press.  

Synchronicity: Oracle of Sun Medicine by Tureeda Mikell

https://www.nomadicpress.org/store

MARGARET STAWOWY recently edited a poetry anthology titled Storms of the Inland Sea: Poems of Alzheimer's and Dementia Caregiving to be published 2022. She recently appeared on KQED with a Perspective on Caregiving that you can listen to on the KQED website, which I will post in the chat shortly. She has won awards for her poems from Beyond Baroque, Atlanta Review, and Naugatuck River Review, among others.  Her first book, Keeper of the Pond, was published in 2017. 

https://www.kqed.org/perspectives/201601141333/margaret-stawowy-a-huge-hole-in-the-safety-net

KATHE JORDAN’s was actually a reader in the very first Second Sunday reading ever, back in 2017. poems appear in The Sun, Chautauqua, Comstock Review, New Ohio Review, and Atlanta Review, among others. A recipient of the San Miguel de Allende Prize for Poetry and the Sidney Lanier Poetry Award, her poem, “My Late Breast,” which includes an interview by the magazine, was selected by The Sun as one of ten items for their 2021 Summer Reading List. Kathryn loves to hike the trails, listening for birdsong to translate to poems. 

http://kathrynjordan.org/index.html

CATHRYN SHEA is the author of the full-length poetry collection “Genealogy Lesson for the Laity.” Her chapbooks include “Backpack Full of Leaves,” “Secrets Hidden in a Pear Tree,” “It’s Raining Lullabies,” and “Snap Bean.” Cathryn’s poetry has been nominated for Best of the Net and she has also been shortlisted or selected for a variety of poetry prizes, including a merit finalist for the Atlanta Review 2013 International Poetry Competition. In 2004 she received the Marjorie J. Wilson Award for Poetry judged by Charles Simic. Her poems have appeared in anthologies and in many journals including Poet Lore, New Orleans Review, Tar River Poetry, Gargoyle, Tinderbox, and elsewhere. She served as editor for the annual Marin Poetry Center Anthology. 

www.cathrynshea.com

Georgina Marie is the Lake County Poet Laureate for 2020-2024; the first Mexican-American and youngest to serve in this role for the county. In June 2021, she was selected as a Poets Laureate Fellow with the Academy of American Poets. She is the Literary Coordinator and Poetry Out Loud Coordinator for the Lake County Arts Council, co-creator of the The Bloom's poetry column, and Poet in Residence for The Bloom. In 2020, she was an Anne G. Locasio scholar for the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference and is now a member of their Board of Directors. Most recently, she was a Brereton scholar for the Napa Valley Writers’ Conference. She is currently working on her full-length poetry manuscript. She lives with her rescue dogs Kenya and Micco and her formerly feral cat Mistie. Visit her website at www.georginamariepoet.com. 

Siân Killingsworth is a writer living in Northern California. Her work has been published in journals such as the Blue Earth Review, Typehouse Literary Journal, Stonecoast Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry (Poets Resist), and other journals and anthologies. She received an MFA from the New School, where she worked on the staff of Lit. She founded and ran a poetry reading series hosted by the First Presbyterian Church of Brooklyn.  Siân taught English Composition for the City University of New York at York College and has led poetry craft workshops in Brooklyn, Boston, and San Francisco. She currently serves as the Members’ Anthology Editor for the Marin Poetry Center. Siân is delighted to take up the mantle of maintaining the Second Sunday Poetry Series.

To close out the reading I’m delighted to give you MK Chavez. She is an Afro-Latinx writer, educator, and coach. She is the author of Mothermorphosis, Dear Animal, and several chapbooks including, “A Brief History of the Selfie.” Chavez curates the reading series Lyrics & Dirges and is co-director of the Berkeley Poetry Festival. She is a recipient of the Alameda County Arts Leadership Award, the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award, and the 2021 San Francisco Foundation/Nomadic Press literary award. She has received fellowships from Hedgebrook, Caldera, CantoMundo, Community of Writers, Sitka, and VONA. Her most recent work can be found in the Academy of Poets Poem-A-Day series and at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco with the Voice of Trees projects.