HoCoPoLitSo welcomes all to the March edition of the Wilde Readings Series, with Fran Abrams and Jared Smith, hosted by Linda Joy Burke. Join us at the Columbia Art Center on Tuesday, March 12th at 7 p.m., at 6100 Foreland Garth, Columbia, MD 21045. Please spread the word— bring your friends, family and students! Light refreshments will be served and books by the readers available for sale.

An open mic follows the featured authors and we encourage you to participate. Please prepare no more than five minutes of performance time, about two poems. Sign up when you arrive, or in advance by calling the Columbia Arts Center at (410)-730-0075.

Below, get to know Fran and Jared!

Who is the person in your life (past or present) that shows up most often in your writing?

Fran: My mother who passed away over 50 years ago. She not only shows up but also inspires my writing. I credit her with encouraging my love for the arts and humanities.

Jared: The people I write about most often are working people who find dignity in the jobs they do and who respect those around them. They are thoughtful types who enjoy music, art, and the world around them rather than money or thinking about getting ahead. I have very seldom written in my poetry about individual people I have known, but rather what has been accomplished by them or experienced by them. I seldom mention them by name.

Where is your favorite place to write?

Fran: At my dining room table. Even though I have an office and a desktop computer, I love the afternoon light that comes into my dining room and enjoy writing on my laptop in that setting.

Jared: I take notes in my head for lines of poetry wherever I am, whether at work, or walking in the forest, or observing people at a coffee shop, or any of the other activities I’m involved in each day. These phrases, lines of poetry and the images they come from flow together over a period of time until they begin to lead to a new vision or understanding of some aspect of life that is new and exciting to me. Then I go into my study where I begin to put them down on paper, generally working on my computer because the visions and thoughts flow faster than I can write longhand.

Do you have any consistent pre-writing rituals?

Fran: No. I write when inspiration hits— no time for rituals. I send myself rough drafts by email on my phone, and as I noted, I write at my desk and at the dining room table. Sometimes I will simply stop in the middle of checking emails or other tasks and start writing, picking up a thread that just ran through my mind.

Jared: I’ve always found it important to have a ritual to prepare my mind for entering into the nonlinear poetic trance necessary to my writing. Key for me is my study, which is covered on three walls with bookshelves bulging with both hardcover books and hundreds of small press magazines and journals dating from the European Romantics to the present day. The other walls contains abstract art paintings and drawings. Having those books, journals, and artworks surrounding me somehow infuses me with and makes me a part of the unending conversation all poets and creative people enter into across time as to what life is and how rich it is.

Who always gets a first read?

Fran: I spend a great deal of time revising my own poems. However, I am very fortunate to participate in two workshop groups. When I feel a poem is close to being finished, but not quite there, I share it with one of those groups.

Jared: Generally my wife gets the first read.

What is a book you’ve read more than twice (and would read again)?

Fran: One of my favorite books of poetry is Scattered Clouds by Reuben Jackson who sadly passed away recently. I have read it many times and expect to read it again. I’ve also written a Golden Shovel poem based on one of his poems.

Jared: There are so many books I read and re-read for pleasure . . . books of poetry, novels, essays. I have hundreds of volumes of poetry and novels in my study but I guess that The Wasteland And Other Poems by T.S. Eliot has to be the book of poetry I’ve gone back to most often. Among novels I’ve gone back most often is Catch-22 by Joseph Heller and The Lord Of The Rings by Tolkien. Looking For Dragon Smoke by Robert Bly is the best essay I’ve come across on how modern poetry works.

What is the most memorable reading you have attended?

Fran: A reading by Aaron Caycedo-Kimura at the Gaithersburg Book Festival was the most memorable. His two books—a full-length collection titled Common Grace and a chapbook titled Ubasute—include some of the most moving poems I’ve encountered, and his reading of the poems was superb.

Jared: There have been so many! The earliest was one I attended by Galway Kinnell, when I was a young boy and went up to talk with him afterwards and he told me that he thought I would become a good poet. Somewhat later I took a two hour bus trip to head to a reading by Robert Bly, and that led to many years of correspondence with him. A reading by Beat poet Gregory Corso in New York led to the two of us hanging out together for several months. A reading W.S. Merwin gave to celebrate the publication of his book Migration led to an extended talk with him and resulted in my reviewing the book for The Pedestal Magazine. And then there are all the wonderful meetings and talks I have had with both known and unknown poets at open mics over the years! It is wonderful to listen to poets converse as well as read their works.

• Fran Abrams’ poems have been published in Cathexis-Northwest Press, The American Journal of Poetry, The Ravens Perch, Delmarva Review, Gargoyle, and many others. Her poems also appear in more than a dozen anthologies. Her autobiographical book of poems titled I Rode the Second Wave: A Feminist Memoir was published in November 2022. Her first chapbook, The Poet Who Loves Pythagoras, was released in April 2023. Her second chapbook, Arranging Words, was published in November 2023.

Fran lives in Rockville, Maryland and can be found online at franabramspoetry.com, and on Facebook as Fran Abrams, Poet.

• Jared Smith is the author of 16 books of poetry, as well as two stage productions. His poems, essays, and commentary have appeared in hundreds of journals and anthologies in this country and overseas. He is Poetry Editor of Turtle Island Quarterly, and served on the editorial boards of New York Quarterly, Home Planet News, and The Pedestal Magazine, along with the boards of arts and literary nonprofits in New York, Illinois, and Colorado.

You can find more on Jared at his home page, jaredsmith.info.