What we’re looking for at Coastside Poetry
In 2017, we agreed to take over as co-hosts for this reading series when the original host, Ryan Warren, moved out of the area. Our motive was and is to continue a dedicated poetry series. Tasks such as maintaining a website, scheduling featured poets, promoting the series and otherwise communicating with members of the poetry community all take time and money, but for us, poetry is worth it.
And by “poetry” we mean not prose with ragged line ends, but word-craft: we like to see works that demonstrate imagination, economy of expression, creative use of rhythm, uncommon and evocative imagery, internal rhyme, intriguing metaphor, thoughtful contemplation of interesting themes, words which roll beautifully off the tongue. Narrative, lyrical, free-verse, formal verse, blank verse, experimental verse – all are welcome.
What we’re not looking for
Porn or gratuitous violence (yes, we’ve gotten both a few times)
Prose
Music. We’d love to hear you speak your lyrics, but please don’t plan to come and sing them and/or accompany yourself on the guitar. Or play the piano. Why? Because music tends to overshadow words, and Coastside Poetry is about words. Once music is allowed, more musicians take part, the audience changes and starts coming especially for the music and soon poetry is relegated to second place.
So, dear reader, if you want the same things we do, please come visit us on the second Tuesday of every month!
Onward! Diane Lee Moomey and Steve Long