The Poetry Box LIVE – NOVEMBER Edition!

Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026 @ 4:00 PM (Pacific)

3pm (Alaskan) / 5pm (Mountain) / 6pm (Central) / 7pm (Eastern)

Featuring:

• Shawn Pittard (CA) – author of The Sound of Water
• Carolyn Martin (OR) — author of Brainstorming
• Ann Farley (OR) – author of Loose on the Leash
• Stephen James Penner (OR) – author of Thin Soup

How to Join Zoom Show:

PLEASE NOTE: EVERYONE MUST REGISTER IN ADVANCE.

About the Featured Poets:

Ann Farley, an only child of two only children, learned at an early age to entertain herself by making up stories and playing with words. Her poems have appeared in Peregrine, Timberline Review, Third Wednesday, Gobshite Quarterly, Willawaw, Verseweavers, and others. Her first chapbook, Tell Her Yes, was published in 2022.

She loves travel, anywhere and everywhere, from local trails to the tip of South Africa, and enjoys photography, watercolor painting, a good book and a cup of tea. She lives in Beaverton, Oregon with her kind and patient husband, Kevin, and their exuberant German Shepherd, Ella.

You can learn more about Ann’s book soon.

Shawn Pittard is the author of four slender volumes of poetry: Shelter in Place from The Poetry Box; Witness, which was a Finalist in The Poetry Box 2024 chapbook contest; Standing in the River, which was the winner of Tebot Bach’s 2010 Clockwise Chapbook Competition; and These Rivers from Rattlesnake Press. His poems have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and featured at American Life in Poetry. He’s been a coach for Poetry Out Loud and a California Poet in the Schools, taught recitation and writing in middle schools and high schools, including juvenile hall (yep, they’re good kids), as well as with veterans and the men in Folsom Prison. By day, he labored in the field of environmental protection, planning, and public policy, focusing on energy.

You can learn more about Shawn’s book soon

From New Jersey English teacher to international management trainer; from author of business books to poetry collections; from work addict to devotee of the Spanish proverb, “It is beautiful to do nothing and rest afterwards,” Carolyn Martin is blissfully retired—and resting—in Clackamas, Oregon.

Although a stroke in August 2025 weakened her body. Martin’s mind remains strong. She still embraces poetry as her way of interacting with the world––in images, rhythms, sounds, and intensities of language. That is why she continues to pursue the joyful challenge of translating experience into as few words as possible. In doing so, she embraces Anne Sexton’s dictate: “One of my secret instructions to myself as a poet is: Whatever you do, don’t be boring.”

Martin’s poems have appeared in more than 200 publications around the world, and she has six full-length collections and three chapbooks under her creative belt. In addition, she was the winner of the 2025 Hudson-Fowler Prize for Poetry from the University of Central Arkansas.

You can learn more about Carolyn’s book HERE

You can learn more about Stephen’s book HERE

The post The Poetry Box LIVE (Nov 14, 2026) appeared first on The Poetry Box.

The Poetry Box LIVE – OCTOBER Edition!

Saturday, Oct. 10, 2026 @ 4:00 PM (Pacific)

3pm (Alaskan) / 5pm (Mountain) / 6pm (Central) / 7pm (Eastern)

Featuring:

• Susan Coultrap-McQuin (MN) – author of So Much Depends on the Light
• Phillip Shabazz (NC) — author of Middle Ground
• Lori Rosenlof Drake (NC) – author of Ruffles to Rifles
• Stuart Watson (OR) – author of Death Is the Dismount

How to Join Zoom Show:

PLEASE NOTE: EVERYONE MUST REGISTER IN ADVANCE.

About the Featured Poets:

Susan Coultrap-McQuin is a retired educator and nature lover. From a very young age, she has had her hands in the soil of gardens and her eyes on natural wonders. It was probably inevitable that, when she retired and started writing poetry over ten years ago, she would first be inspired by the wild prairie, flowers, trees, and pond of her own backyard and neighborhood in Minnesota. She loves to wander woods and fields, both at home and abroad; if you invite her to an arboretum or botanical garden, she will always say “yes.”

Susan grew up in a Chicago suburb and earned degrees at Iowa State and the U of Iowa.  She was a professor and administrator at universities in Minnesota and New York and has served on a variety of regional and national boards. Her poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies, and she has a chapbook of her travel poems, entitled What We Bring Home (The Poetry Box, 2021). Among her honors is a Pushcart nomination. Susan is married with two grown children and four grandchildren, who join her in tending gardens and naming wildflowers and pollinators in her yard.

You can learn more about Susan’s book HERE

Phillip Shabazz serves as a Poet-in-the-Schools of North Carolina and is the author of four poetry collections and two novels, including the coming-of-age novel Pearls In The Sea (2026). His most recent collection, Moonflower, is published by Fernwood Press (2025). His work has been nominated for Best of the Net and has been included in the anthologies Paul Green: North Carolina Writers on the Legacy of the State’s Most Celebrated Playwright, Crossing the Rift: North Carolina Poets on 9/11 & Its Aftermath, and Home Is Where: African American Poetry from the Carolinas. Some publication credits in journals include Fine Lines, Florida Review, Galway Review, BREATHE, Queen’s Quarterly, K’in, and Thimble.

You can learn more about Phillip’s book HERE

A former journalist and educator, Lori Rosenlof Drake is a freelance writer whose debut poetry chapbook, Moonshine Shared with a Mishmash of Musings, will be published in August 2026. Drake’s work has appeared in The Christian Century, San Diego Woman, Mothers Always Write and the Nebraska Alumnus among others. The recipient of several Honorable Mentions in the Writers’ Digest National Competition, her writing has received support through a grant from the North Carolina Arts Council. As the Executive Director of the Farmville Chamber of Commerce in North Carolina, Drake implemented the National Poetry Month celebration in her hometown and led the initiative for three years. Drake lives with her husband in North Carolina. They have six grown children and two grandchildren. lorirosenlofdrake.net

You can learn more about Lori’s book HERE

You can learn more about Stu’s book HERE

The post The Poetry Box LIVE (Oct 10, 2026) appeared first on The Poetry Box.