HoCoPoLitSo welcomes all to the June edition of the Wilde Reading Series, with Kathy MacMillan and Sam Schmidt, hosted by Laura Shovan. Due to the closure of the Columbia Art Center for renovations, this month’s reading will be held via online livestream: please join us on Zoom, Tuesday, June 11th at 7 p.m. through the following link: bit.ly/wildereadingjune24

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 in the chat when you arrive, or let us know in advance by contacting HoCoPoLitSo or the Wilde Reading Series hosts.

Below, get to know Kathy and Sam!

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

Kathy: My sister. She is 16 years older than I am, so we didn’t become close until we were adults, but I often find that she shows up in unexpected ways in my stories.

Sam: I would say my late father—because of all that went unresolved between us—followed by my wife Virginia Crawford (also a poet) and my eldest child Luca (pronouns they/them; singer-songwriter).

Where is your favorite place to write?

Kathy: An antique secretary desk in the corner of my living room. I try to keep that desk only for creative writing projects, not mundane things like paying bills.

Sam: I have a big Apple computer in the dining room—although sometimes I will speak or tap into my phone.

Do you have any consistent pre-writing rituals?

Kathy: Make a cup of apricot tea, light a candle, put on my writing sweater, pull up a chair next to my desk for my cat.

Sam: For my most recent book, Dark Bird, I took a picture of a particular tree each day. Thought about it all day while at work as my writing prompt. Then laid the poem down on the computer before going to bed.

Who always gets a first read?

Kathy: My critique partner (and sometimes co-author), Manuela.

Sam: My wife Virginia.

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

Kathy: Watership Down by Richard Adams, The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien, and the Queen’s Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner.

Sam: For poetry, I regularly dip back into modernist classics: Leaves of Grass, The Wasteland, Wallace Stevens’ Harmonium and Idea of Order. I’m also a big fantasy fan. I have read The Lord of the Rings several times. When my kids were younger, I read the Harry Potter books several times, and not just for them. Right now I’m reading through Robin Hobbs’ Farseer trilogy for the second time.

What is the most memorable reading you have attended?

Kathy: Meg Eden Kuyatt’s launch for GOOD DIFFERENT. I am one of her critique partners and it was incredible to see that book come to life.

Sam: A recent reading at Manor Mill (Monkton) featuring Bruce Jacobs and Mark Sanders has to be up there. They both write poems that vibrate emotionally and bring passion to their delivery. The open mic brought out more fine poets, well known and less well known.

• Kathy MacMillan (she/her) is a writer, nationally certified American Sign Language interpreter, librarian, and signing storyteller. She writes picture books, children’s nonfiction, and middle grade and young adult fiction. Her debut young adult novel, Sword and Verse, was a finalist for the Compton Crook Award. She has also published eight resource books for educators, librarians, and parents.

Kathy can be found online at kathymacmillan.com, and on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter as “kathys_quill”. Her books are available for purchase from major online retailers— and with author signatures from the online store of Deaf Camps, Inc., in support of a great cause.

• Sam Schmidt‘s books include Suburban Myths (Beothuk Books 2012) and Dark Bird (Galileo Press 2024). For more than a decade he edited and published WordHouse, a newsletter for Maryland writers, and hosted the WordHouse reading series at the Minas Gallery. His work has been published in such journals as Passager, Free State Review, and Gargoyle. He is a three-time recipient of the Maryland State Individual Artist Grant and has a Master’s Degree in Comparative Literature from Johns Hopkins University. His wife Virginia Crawford, also a poet, is the author of questions for water (Apprentice House Press 2021). Sam lives and works in Baltimore, Maryland.

Find Sam online at darkbirdpoetry.com, or on Facebook, where he accepts friend requests from actual people. His books are available for purchase from the publisher, Galileo Press, and from Amazon.