E'ville's Poet Laureate launches "Poems on the Emery Go-Round" program

The City of Emeryville is asking you to “Put down your phone, pick up a poem!”. As part of the Poet Laureate program of Emeryville in partnership with the ETMA, are launching “Poems on the Emery Go-Round”. Beginning in October, each month a new poem will be printed on card stock and placed on the buses for riders to read and take away. They are looking for poems that “surprise, delight, and inspire”. Poems chosen to be on the Emery Go-Round will also appear on the Poet Laureate page of the City of Emeryville website.

In 2010, the City of Emeryville implemented a Poet Laureate Program to support awareness of poetry and the literary arts in the City and schools. The City’s second poet laureate, Sarah Kobrinsky is currently serving a two-year term, initiated in October 2013. A poet laureate historically, according to Wikipedia, is a tradition dating back to the first days of classical civilization, to associate laurel with proficiency in arts and poetry, or with victory.

Duties of the Emeryville Poet Laureate include:

Representing the City of Emeryville and the poetic arts through participation in poetry events and interviews.
Presenting poetry at no more than four events per year. These events may vary from year-to-year, but could include readings at scheduled City events and in the schools.
Accepting invitations, as schedule permits, to present his/her poetry at community events or with community groups, in interviews with the media, and to submit works for publication on the City website and other outreach vehicles.
Acting as an advocate and resource for poetry and literary events in Emeryville

Kobrinsky, according to here facebook fan page, was “born in Canada, reared in North Dakota, seasoned in England, and tempered in California. Her poems and stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Magma Poetry, Monkeybicycle, 100 Word Story, Fjords Review, Eleven Eleven, Shampoo Poetry, The Molotov Cocktail, among many others”. On Kobrinsky’s personal website she notes “This is where I will write about my experiences as the PL of E’ville, share details about forthcoming readings/events, interview other poets who are doing interesting work within their communities, and post all kinds of other things that delight me.

A couple of examples of her Emeryville-specific work:

For fun, my brother and his wife visit IKEA to watch couples argue and fall apart over the price of furniture that will also fall apart.

Shellmound
The refuse of life well-lived piled high at the water’s edge—
In a hundred years’ time, what will we have left behind?

A reading of Kobrinsky’s work “Jesus Smokes” at the literary event Quiet Lightning:
[youtube id=”16jHDzB6D-w” width=”620″ height=”360″]

Submission guidelines:

This call is open to poets who live within the nine counties of the San Francisco Bay Area (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, and Sonoma), though the debut poem for this program will be the work of an individual who lives or works in Emeryville.
Simultaneous submissions are welcome, but please notify us right away if your work has been accepted elsewhere. Send your submission to: poetry.emery@gmail.com or through the form below. We will try to respond to your submission within a few weeks time.
Please Include: