THE Poetry Loft

LOFT friends and members are welcome to SHARE good news and upcoming events with us. Email info@thepoetryloft.org.     

EVENTS: 

Words on Fire: OPEN MIC at William Hall Library, Cranston, RI                 

Meets the first Wednesday of every month.  Co-hosts Zack Berger and Ira Schaeffer. Registration required at: zach@cranstonlibrary.org or call 781-2450.  Each writer will have 5 minutes maximum. Share your poems, fiction, non-fiction essays, and novel excerpts. For more info visit: events.cranstonlibrarry.org 

Congratulations to the following writers:

Michael Crowley’s chapbook, Later We All Had a Good Laugh, was published in 2025 by Poetry Loft Press. A book launch was held in May at a Poetry on the Patio gathering in Cranston, sponsored by The Poetry Loft. Michael makes the ordinary into something artful. —Thomas Chandler. Michael Crowley is one of my favorite poets.—Darcie Dennigan

Wit and wisdom rule in Crowley‘s fine collection.—James Cronin  

James Cronin's second full length book, The Mortal Angels, published in Sept. 2024, is available for sale. His first collection, World of Shadows (Poetry Loft Press), is also available for sale on Amazon.
The Mortal Angels suffuses traditional forms with lyrical music and a broad range of illusions … all with philosophical aplomb and erudite wit. — Tina Cane, RI Poet Laureate Emeritus

Diana Cole's full length poetry collection, Between Selves, published by Indian press cyberwit.net in 2023, is available for sale. Her chapbook, Songs by Heart, is also available from cyberwit.net. 

Ira Schaeffer won the Loft Chapbook Award for Summer Drowning (Poetry Loft Press, 2015) judged by Jane Lunin Perel. Schaeffer won first place in the 2016 Galway Kinnell poetry contest sponsored by the Pawtucket Arts Panel for his poems "Basic Training" and "Walking the Steere Hill Preserve."  Ira's poem "Primavera" was nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Origami Poets Project in 2014.  

Adele Bourne's book Tide Roaring In has been published by Kelsay Books, 2016. Available on Amazon.

Karen Haskell won second place for her poem in the 2015 Galway Kinnell poetry contest judged by RI State Poet Laureate Rick Benjamin, and Lisa Starr. Her chapbook, Sixty Years, was published by Finishing Line Press. 

Judy Gamble's ekphrastic poetry has appeared in the Poetry and Art book published by the Wickford Art Association.
Beatrice Lazarus was honored to read from her book, Lay Bare the Canvas:  New England Poetry and Art, at the Longfellow House, Boston, hosted by the New England Poetry Club. (Beatrice Lazarus, editor; Poetry Loft Press).
"Poets and Players" : A book launch sponsored by The Poetry Loft to celebrate the publication of chapbooks by Karen Haskell (Sixty Years, Finishing Line Press) and Sandra Moran (Caught in the Open, Poetry Loft Press).  Featuring a staged reading of Analgesia, (Ars Medica, University of Toronto Press) a one act play by James Celenza, at the William Hall Library, Cranston RI. 

Sandra Moran's chapbook Caught in the Open, a finalist for the LOFT Chapbook Award, was published by the Poetry Loft Press, 2016. Caught in the Open is elegant and edgy, and Moran a master of poetic slippage as she explores the lives of the forgotten and disenfranschised, the violated and the vulnerable." ~Catherine Imbriglio, Brown University instructor.