WYCE Electric Poetry

02/23/2021

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry is in honor of and features poems from Suzi Q. Smith, Justin Rogers, Damien Tillman, Allayne Thomas, and G Foster III and music from Noname, BROCKHAMPTON, and Jamila Woods! Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

WYCE is an independent, community radio station serving the communities of Grand Rapids and West Michigan with its on-air FM programming at 88.1 Mhz, and reaching out to the world through online streaming on the Internet.

12/22/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Suzi Q. Smith! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST to 88.1 FM or listen live online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Suzi Q. Smith is an award-winning artist, activist, and educator who lives in Denver, Colorado. Her first collection of poems, "A Gospel of Bones", will be available from Alternating Current Press this month, and her second collection, "Poems for the End of the World", will be available in from Finishing Line Press in June 2021.

12/15/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Lizzy Fox! Listen live at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM WYCE or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Lizzy Fox’s poetry has appeared in The Greensboro Review, Hunger Mountain, Puerto Del Sol, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and her debut collection, Red List Blue, will release on January 15, 2021 through Finishing Line Press. Lizzy teaches English and Social Studies at the middle and high school levels. She lives in Vermont with her fiancé and their cat Rhu. You can visit www.lizzyfoxpoetry.com for information on upcoming online readings.

12/08/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with Elana Bell! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Elana Bell is the author of Mother Country (BOA Editions, 2020), poems about fertility, motherhood, and mental illness. Elana’s debut collection of poetry, Eyes, Stones (LSU Press, 2012), was selected by F***y Howe as the winner of the 2011 Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets, and brings her complex heritage as the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors to consider the difficult question of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Elana is the recipient of grants and fellowships from the Jerome Foundation, the Edward Albee Foundation, and the Brooklyn Arts Council. Her writing has appeared in AGNI, Harvard Review, and the Massachusetts Review, among others.

12/01/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Aleigha Kely! Listen live at 10:10 PM EST on 88.1 FM WYCE or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Aleigha Kely is a poet living in Grand Rapids. She is a writer, musician, and supporter of all things creative. You can find more of her poetry at poetryaleigha.wordpress.com.

10/27/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with Samantha Kolber, author of the newly-released "Birth of a Daughter"! Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Samantha Kolber’s poems have appeared in Oddball Magazine, Mom Egg Review, Tiny Seed Journal, Rise Up Review, Hunger Mountain, and anthologies. She received a Ruth Stone Poetry Prize in 2010, and a Vermont Poetry Society prize in 2014. She has her MFA from Goddard College. Originally from New Jersey, she lives in Montpelier, Vermont, where she coordinates author events for her favorite independent bookstore, Bear Pond Books, and is the Poetry Series Editor for Rootstock Publishing. Birth of a Daughter (Kelsay Books) is her first chapbook. Learn more at samanthakolber.com.

09/02/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems from Christine Higgins! Tune in at 10:15 PM to 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Christine Higgins is the author of Hallow (Cherry Grove, 2020). Her latest chapbook, Hello Darling, was the second-place winner in the 2019 Poetry Box competition. She is the recipient of two Maryland State Arts Council Awards for both poetry and non-fiction. You can visit her website at: www.christinehigginswriter.com.

WYCE is an independent, community radio station serving the communities of Grand Rapids and West Michigan with its on-air FM programming at 88.1 Mhz, and reaching out to the world through online streaming on the Internet.

08/25/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with Jose Hernandez Diaz! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST to 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Jose Hernandez Diaz is a 2017 NEA Poetry Fellow. He holds degrees in English and Creative Writing from the University of California at Berkeley and Antioch University Los Angeles. His book, The Fire Eater, is now available from .

08/18/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, tune in to hear poems and conversation with José Olivarez! If you're interested in reading "Citizen Illegal," join other readers in November to discuss and celebrate Olivarez's poems with Poetry Book Club! More information here: https://www.facebook.com/events/732268560947122

About the poet: José Olivarez is the son of Mexican immigrants. His debut book of poems, Citizen Illegal, was a finalist for the PEN/ Jean Stein Award and a winner of the 2018 Chicago Review of Books Poetry Prize. It was named a top book of 2018 by The Adroit Journal, NPR, and the New York Public Library. Along with Felicia Chavez and Willie Perdomo, he is co-editing the forthcoming anthology, The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNEXT. He is the co-host of the poetry podcast, The Poetry Gods. In 2018, he was awarded the first annual Author and Artist in Justice Award from the Phillips Brooks House Association and named a Debut Poet of 2018 by Poets & Writers. In 2019, he was awarded a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation. His work has been featured in The New York Times, The Paris Review, and elsewhere.

07/28/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Marty McConnell! Listen live at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM WYCE or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Marty McConnell is the author of “wine for a shotgun," “when they say you can’t go home again, what they mean is you were never there,” and “Gathering Voices: Creating a Community-Based Poetry Workshop." McConnell’s work has been published in numerous anthologies, including Best American Poetry 2014; Bullets & Butterflies: Q***r Spoken Word Poetry; A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry; City of the Big Shoulders: An Anthology of Chicago Poetry; and Word Warriors: 35 Women Leaders in the Spoken Word Movement, as well as journals including Bellevue Literary Review, Gulf Coast, Indiana Review, Crab Orchard, and Beloit Poetry Journal, among many others.

McConnell was recently selected for a residency at Hedgebrook, and she has performed and facilitated workshops at schools and festivals around the country, including The Dodge Poetry Festival, Palm Beach Poetry Festival, Wicker Park Arts Festival, Connecticut Poetry Festival, Cornell University, University of Utah, James Madison University, Old Dominion, University of Connecticut, University of Arkansas, DePaul University, and more. She lives in Chicago with her wife and their several thousand favorite books.

07/21/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with Tim Hawkins! Listen live at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or www.wyce.org.

About the poet: Tim Hawkins has lived and traveled widely throughout North America, Southeast Asia, Europe and Latin America, where he has worked as a journalist, technical writer and teacher in international schools. His writing has appeared in more than thirty print and online publications, including Blueline, Eclectica, Iron Horse Literary Review, The Midwest Quarterly, The Pedestal Magazine, Tipton Poetry Journal, and Valparaiso Poetry Review. He has been nominated twice for a Pushcart Prize (2011, 2017) and was chosen to serve as preliminary judge for the 47th Annual Dyer-Ives Poetry Competition (2015) judged by Mark Doty. His poetry collection, Wanderings at Deadline, was published in 2012 and chapbooks Jeremiad Johnson and Synchronized Swimmers appeared in 2019. Read more at:www.timhawkinspoetry.com.

Tim Hawkins Poetry

07/14/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Kelly Grace Thomas! Listen live at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM WYCE or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Kelly Grace Thomas is the winner of the 2017 Neil Postman Award for Metaphor from Rattle, 2018 finalist for the Rita Dove Poetry Award and multiple pushcart prize nominee. Her first full-length collection, "Boat Burned," released with YesYes Books in January 2020. Kelly’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in: Best New Poets 2019, Los Angeles Review, Redivider, Nashville Review, Muzzle, DIAGRAM, and more. Kelly currently works to bring poetry to underserved youth as the Director of Education and Pedagogy for Get Lit-Words Ignite. Kelly is a three-time poetry slam championship coach and the co-author of Words Ignite: Explore, Write and Perform, Classic and Spoken Word Poetry (Literary Riot), currently taught in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Kelly has received fellowships from Tin House Winter Workshop, Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing and the Kenyon Review Young Writers. Kelly and her sister, Kat Thomas, won Best Feature Length Screenplay at the Portland Comedy Film Festival for their romantic comedy, Magic Little Pills. Kelly lives in the Bay Area with her husband, Omid, and is currently working on her debut novel, a YA thriller, titled "Only 10.001." Visit her online at www.kellygracethomas.com.

06/23/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Robin Gow! Listen live at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Robin Gow is a white q***r and trans poet and young adult author. They are the author of Our Lady of Perpetual Degeneracy (Tolsun Books 2020) and Honeysuckle (Finishing Line Press 2019). Their poetry has recently been featured in Washington Square Review, New Delta Review, and Ghost City Press. A Million Quiet Revolutions, Gow's first Young Adult novel is forthcoming with Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

06/16/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Cynthia Guardado! Listen live at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Cynthia Guardado /sIHn-thee-uh Gwarr-Dah-Doe/ (she/her/hers) is a Salvadorian-American author of ENDEAVOR, a poetry collection (World Stage Press 2017). She is a tenured Professor at Fullerton College and the managing editor of LiveWire a literary and arts journal. Her manuscript Cenizas is currently under review and was a finalist for the National Poetry Series (2019). Her poems have also appeared in Poetry Magazine, ITWOW: In the Words of Women International Anthology, Huizache, Bozalta Journal, The Acentos Review, The Packinghouse Review, The Wandering Song: Central American Writing in the United States, and The Normal School.

06/09/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Sara Elkamel! Tune in at 10:15 PM to hear poems and great conversation! You can listen online at wyce.org or on your radio at 88.1 FM.

About the poet: Sara Elkamel is a journalist and poet, living between Cairo and New York. She holds an MA in arts journalism from Columbia University and is currently pursuing an MFA in poetry at New York University. Named a 2020 Gregory Djanikian Scholar by The Adroit Journal, Elkamel’s writing has appeared in The Common, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Rumpus, American Chordata, Winter Tangerine, as part of the Halal If You Hear Me anthology, and elsewhere.

05/17/2020

José Guadalupe Olivarez's "Citizen Illegal" is on sale for $8 right now at Haymarket Books! This sale is excellent for those who aren't normally able to afford new books. Also on sale are all four of the BreakBeat Poet collections! Check it out!

Haymarket Books is a radical, independent, nonprofit book publisher based in Chicago.

04/21/2020

Tonight's featured poet is Cameron Awkward-Rich! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or listen live online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Cameron Awkward-Rich is the author of two collections of poetry: Sympathetic Little Monster (Ricochet Editions, 2016) and Dispatch (Persea Books, 2019). His poetry has appeared in The American Poetry Review, POETRY, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. Presently, he is an assistant professor of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

04/14/2020

Tonight's feature on Electric Poetry is the one-and-only KT Herr! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or listen live online at wyce.org.

About the poet: KT Herr (she/her/hers) is a q***r poet, singer-songwriter, and grilled cheese enthusiast from Lancaster, PA. In a past life, she was board secretary for the literary nonprofit Write616, poetry editor for The 3288 Review, host of WYCE’s “Electric Poetry,” and no one’s favorite bartender. KT is a Thomas Lux Scholar and Jane Cooper Fellow at Sarah Lawrence College (MFA 2020), where she has held positions with LUMINA, the Sunnyside College Prep program, and the Right-to-Write program, and where she serves as co-director of the 2020 Sarah Lawrence Poetry Festival. KT is a Pabst Scholarship recipient from the Atlantic Center for the Arts, and currently works as a publishing intern with Black Lawrence Press. Her poems are published or forthcoming in Quarter After Eight, SWWIM, Pilgrimage Magazine, and elsewhere. She delights in whimsy, well-posed questions, and other people’s pets.

03/31/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with José Olivarez. Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: José Olivarez is the son of Mexican immigrants. His debut book of poems, Citizen Illegal, was a finalist for the PEN/ Jean Stein Award and a winner of the 2018 Chicago Review of Books Poetry Prize. It was named a top book of 2018 by The Adroit Journal, NPR, and the New York Public Library. Along with Felicia Chavez and Willie Perdomo, he is co-editing the forthcoming anthology, The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNEXT. He is the co-host of the poetry podcast, The Poetry Gods. In 2018, he was awarded the first annual Author and Artist in Justice Award from the Phillips Brooks House Association and named a Debut Poet of 2018 by Poets & Writers. In 2019, he was awarded a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation. His work has been featured in The New York Times, The Paris Review, and elsewhere.

03/11/2020

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Tyler French! Listen live at wyce.org or 88.1 FM.

About the poet: Tyler French (he/him/his) is a writer, organizer, and public humanist living in Washington, D.C. His first full-length book of poetry, He Told Me was published by Capturing Fire Press May 2019. He has writing in Artivate, Assaracus: A Journal of Gay Poetry, Beech Street Review, Bending Genres Journal, Stoked Words, an anthology of q***r poetry, and The Quarry, Split This Rock’s Social Justice Poetry Database. He is a co-creator and baker for Q***r Cookies, a poetry series and bake sale supporting q***r-identified poets.

03/04/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems and conversation with Francesca Bell! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST to 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Francesca Bell’s poems and translations appear in many journals, including ELLE, Massachusetts Review, New Ohio Review, North American Review, Prairie Schooner, and Rattle. She is the author of Bright Stain (Red Hen Press, 2019).

02/25/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, listen to poems and conservation with the National Judge for the 2020 Dyer-Ives Poetry Competition, Keith S. Wilson! Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or wyce.org.

About the poet: Keith S. Wilson is an Affrilachian Poet and Cave Canem fellow. He is a recipient of an NEA fellowship as well as fellowships/grants from Bread Loaf, Kenyon College, Tin House, MacDowell, Vermont Studio Center, UCross, and Millay Colony, among others.

Keith serves as Assistant Poetry Editor at Four Way Review and Digital Media Editor at Obsidian Journal. His first book, Fieldnotes on Ordinary Love, was published by Copper Canyon. Keith’s work has appeared in Poetry, Elle, The Kenyon Review, Adroit Journal, Boston Review, Crab Orchard Review, Narrative, 32 Poems, Arts & Letters, Rhino, and Vinyl.

02/19/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, I'm very excited to feature Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach! Julia will be reading at the Kalamazoo Book Arts Center this Saturday! Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or wyce.org.

About the poet: Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach came to the United States as a Jewish refugee in 1993, from Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine, and grew up in the DC metro area suburb of Rockville, Maryland. She spent three years in Eugene, earning an MFA in Poetry from the University of Oregon is currently back east, working towards a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature and Literary Theory at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on contemporary poetry about the Holocaust, with a special focus on atrocity in former Soviet territories.

Julia is the author of The Many Names for Mother, selected by Ellen Bass as the winner of the 2018 Stan and Tom Wick Poetry prize, now available from Kent State University Press or other book retailers. Purchase her chapbook, The Bear Who Ate the Stars (Split Lip Press, 2014), before it goes out of print in 2020. Her second collection, Don’t Touch the Bones won the 2019 Idaho Poetry Prize and is forthcoming from Lost Horse Press in March 2020. Look out for her newest collection, 40 WEEKS, forthcoming from YesYes Books in 2021. You can find her recent poems in POETRY, American Poetry Review, and The Nation, among others.

02/11/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems from Martha Silano! We talk birds, conservation, and her newest project. Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or wyce.org.

About the poet: Martha Silano’s books include Gravity Assist, Reckless Lovely, and The Little Office of the Immaculate Conception, all from Saturnalia Books. She is also co-author of The Daily Poet: Day-by-Day Prompts for Your Writing Practice (Two Sylvias Press). Martha’s poems have appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, and American Poetry Review, among others. Awards include North American Review’s James Hearst Poetry Prize and The Cincinnati Review’s Robert and Adele Schiff Poetry Prize. She teaches at Bellevue College.

02/04/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, catch poems and conversation with my fave, Brianne Hubbard-Ross! Listen live at 10:15 PM on wyce.org or 88.1 FM!

About the poet: Brianne Hubbard-Ross became immersed in the spoken word culture soon after migrating to Grand Rapids. She now hosts Creston Vibes, a unique and uplifting weekly open mic, with co-host and fellow spoken word artist and activist Kyd Kane.

01/28/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems from and conversation with Kevin Lee McLary! Tune in live at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or wyce.org!

About the poet: Kevin Lee McLary is a 26 year-old poet residing in Kalamazoo, Michigan. His work has previously appeared in Hyype. When he isn’t writing, Kevin can be found watching a movie or playing with his cat. Currently, he is pursuing his bachelor’s degree in creative writing from Goddard College.

01/22/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy poems from GVSU alum Taylor Crowley! Tune in at 10:15 PM EST on 88.1 FM or wyce.org!

About the poet: Taylor Crowley is a Chicago-based poet. She graduated from Grand Valley State University with her BA in writing. Her work can be found on her laptop, (or in her notes app), where it will sit and be revised until a masterpiece is produced. If you would like to keep up with Taylor and her work, you can follow her on Instagram at .

01/14/2020

Tonight on Electric Poetry, enjoy beautiful poems from and conversation with local poet Phillip Sterling. Tune in at 10:15 PM on 88.1 FM or listen online at wyce.org.

About the poet: Phillip Sterling is the author of two books of fiction, In Which Brief Stories Are Told (Wayne State U Press) and Amateur Husbandry (Mayapple Press), two collections of poetry, And Then Snow (Main Street Rag) and Mutual Shores (New Issues) and four chapbook-length series of poems (Significant Others, Abeyance, Quatrains, And for All This: Poems from Isle Royale). A fifth series, Short on Days, will be released from Main Street Rag in 2020. The recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, two Fulbright Awards (Belgium and Poland), and a PEN Syndicated Fiction Award, Sterling has served as Artist-in-Residence for both Isle Royale National Park and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. He is currently Professor Emeritus at Ferris State University, where he founded and coordinated the Literature In Person Reading Series until his retirement in 2013.

12/17/2019

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Jesse Bradley! He reads three poems and discusses slam, lit journals, and interdisciplinary writing! Tune in at 10:15 PM on wyce.org or 88.1 FM.

About the poet: J. Bradley is the author of "Greetings from America: Letters from the Trade War" (Whiskey Tit Books, 2019). His flash fiction piece, “How to Burn a Bridge Job Aid” was selected for Best Small Fictions 2019. He lives at jbradleywrites.com.

11/13/2019

Tonight's episode of Electric Poetry features Muriel Leung! Tune in at 10:15 PM (EST) on 88.1 FM or wyce.org.

About the poet: Muriel Leung is the author of Bone Confetti, winner of the 2015 Noemi Press Book Award. A Pushcart Prize nominated writer, her writing can be found in The Baffler, Cream City Review, Gulf Coast, The Collagist, Fairy Tale Review, and others. She is a recipient of fellowships to Kundiman, VONA/Voices Workshop and the Community of Writers. She is the Poetry Co-Editor of Apogee Journal. She also co-hosts The Blood-Jet Writing Hour podcast with Rachelle Cruz and MT Vallarta. Currently, she is a Dornsife fellow in Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Southern California. She is from Queens, NY.