BRATTLEBORO-On Wednesday, Oct. 29, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at Brooks Memorial Library, all are welcome to join James Crews and his husband, Brad Peacock, co-editors of Love Is for All of Us: Poems of Tenderness & Belonging from the LGBTQ+ Community & Friends, as they share poems about love of all kinds - romantic love, self-love, family and friend love, as well as reverence for the natural world.
Crews and Peacock will talk with local poet and Out in the Open organizer, Diana Whitney, and Crews will lead participants in a short writing experience based on several of the poems shared. Everyone is welcome; no poetry experience is necessary.
The poems in Love Is for All of Us are gathered from a diverse group of contemporary writers, both part of and allied with the LGBTQIA+ community, with a special focus on queer, nonbinary, and transgender poets.
Material is included from writers such as Andrea Gibson, Ellen Bass, Nikita Gill, Mark Doty, Audre Lorde, Richard Blanco, Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Danez Smith, Joy Ladin, Carl Phillips, and Li-Young Lee. Brief essays called "Stories of Becoming" act as touchstones throughout the book, "telling the inspiring stories of LGBTQIA+ people whose experiences may bring hope to others," wrote organizers in a news release.
Crews is the editor of several bestselling books, including The Wonder of Small Things, The Path to Kindness, and How to Love the World, which has over 100,000 copies in print. He is also the author of a collection of essays, Kindness Will Save the World, available as a hardcover and audiobook.
The author of four prize-winning books of poetry, Crews also leads an online writing community called The Monthly Pause (themonthlypause.com). For more information, visit jamescrews.net.
Peacock is a writer, veteran, and longtime organic farmer whose passion is to bring people closer to one another and to the natural world. His poems have been published in several anthologies, and his op-ed pieces have appeared in newspapers across the United States. Find him on Instagram: @theheartofafarmer. He and Crews live on 40 rocky acres in the woods of southern Vermont.
For more information about this event, go to brookslibraryvt.org/event/poetry-out-in-the-open.
This Arts item was submitted to The Commons.