Open Mic Poetry

The Hereford Branch of the Baltimore County Public Library and Manor Mill collaborate in this monthly open mic and writing workshop for all experience levels.

Schedule:

“Get Your Poetry On” Meet-Ups: HerEFORD LIBRARY

NEW TIME! Third Saturday of every month 2:30 PM-4 PM at the Hereford Branch of Baltimore County Public Library. Work with poet Robert Bowie Jr. and Professor Emeritus Michael Fallon, who has taught poetry for 35 years, to create and critically discuss each other's works in a welcoming and supportive atmosphere.

Please email 1-2 poems you’d like to review ahead of time to fallon [at] umbc.edu and bring seven hard copies to the workshop.

Please also review our Guidelines for how to prepare for the workshop, and for participation etiquette.

Registration required. To register for the next meet-up, search for “Get Your Poetry On” on the BCPL website or click here.

Open Mic and Featured Poetry Series: Manor Mill

First Monday of each month. Doors open at 6:15 PM and readings start 6:30 PM up in The Loft. Hosted by Monkton playwright and poet Robert Bowie Jr. and British poet Mel Edden.

If you want to read, please bring a few paper copies for audience members who are hard of hearing. Participants are also encouraged to bring their books for sale.

Each open mic night will also include readings from guest featured poets. Featured poets are established writers with published work.

bruce a. jacobs
FEATURED POET - may 6, 2024

Bruce A. Jacobs’ poems and essays have appeared in African-American Review, Free State Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Loch Raven Review, Seattle Review, Gargoyle, Poetry Kanto, Dickinson Review, and elsewhere. His rant Jeep Cherokee appeared in US Poet Laureate Billy

Collins’ anthology 180 More. His books include Race Manners, Speaking Through My Skin, and Cathode Ray Blues. He has appeared on NPR, C-SPAN, Pacifica, and mainstream outlets. He lives in Washington DC, where he is working on a memoir and a new collection of poems.

MARKUS S. SANDERS
FEATURED POET - may 6, 2024

Markus S. Sanders is a poet, actor, curator, abstract sculptor, and painter who has been active in the Baltimore arts community since the early 90’s. He has been a featured poet at The Martin Luther King Memorial Library, Frostberg State University, The Maryland Institute College of Art and the WHFS Festival as well as numerous literary events and venues. He was awarded an individual artist grant for poetry by the Maryland State Arts Council in 2000, and his prose has appeared in The Loch Raven Review, Art In Progress, The Pearl, The Shattered Wig Review and other literary journals and newspapers.

He has had lead and supporting roles in commercials, plays and independent films and is a former segment writer and director for the internationally syndicated, multiple Emmy and Telly award winning children’s educational program Aqua Kids.  

His sculptures and paintings have been purchased by collectors across the United States and in countries as far flung as Australia. In 2016, he worked with the Overlea Community Association to create the Overlea ArtsFest, and has served as its curator and head juror since its inception.

virginia crawford
FEATURED POET - june 3, 2024

Virginia Crawford has been a long-time teaching artist with the Maryland State Arts Council. She earned her BFA from Emerson College, Boston, and her Master of Letters from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. Her books are Touch from Finishing Line Press and questions for water from Apprentice House Press. She currently teaches English Language Development at the elementary level with Baltimore County Public Schools.

sam schmidt
FEATURED POET - june 3, 2024

In his new collection, Dark Bird (Galileo Press 2024), Sam Schmidt offers poems that begin and end with an ordinary tree.  From that minimalist center, the book travels in a widening trance to explore love, family, politics, philosophy, and old wounds. Acutely observant, ruefully funny, and consistently daring, Dark Bird speaks with a voice that feels both contemporary and evergreen. 

Schmidt is also the author of Suburban Myths (Beothuk Books 2012). For more than a decade he edited and published WordHouse, a newsletter for Maryland writers, and hosted the Baltimore reading series WordHouse at the Minás Gallery. His work has been published in such journals as Passager, Free State Review, and Gargoyle. He is a two-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). Schmidt lives and works in the Baltimore area.

TARA A. ELLIOTT
FEATURED POET - JULY 1, 2024

Tara A. Elliott’s poems have appeared in Ninth Letter, Wildness, and One Art among others. An award-winning public school educator, she also serves as Executive Director of the Eastern Shore Writers Association (ESWA), chair of the annual Bay to Ocean Writers Conference, and host of the popular Thursdays with ESWA programming--free craft & generative workshops open to all writers every Thursday night on Zoom. She has been awarded numerous grants and honors for her writing and her volunteer work in community outreach.  A former student of Lucille Clifton at St. Mary's College of Maryland, Tara is a recent winner of Maryland Arts Council’s Independent Artist Award for Literature.  She has poems forthcoming in Cimarron Review, Cumberland River Review, and 32 Poems.

MEREDITH DAVIES HADAWAY
FEATURED POET - JULY 1, 2024

Meredith Davies Hadaway is the author of four poetry collections, most recently Small Craft Warning, a collaborative volume with artist Marcy Dunn Ramsey. Her previous collection, At the Narrows, was winner of the Delmarva Book Prize. She is the recipient of a Maryland Individual Artist Award, fellowships from the Virginia Center for Creative Arts and holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts.  She is currently the Sophie Kerr Poet-in-Residence at Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland.

HAYES DAVIS
FEATURED POET - AUGUST 5, 2024

Hayes Davis’ first volume, Let Our Eyes Linger was published by Poetry Mutual Press. He is currently serving as the Howard County (Md) Poetry and Literature Society Writer in Residence, and he won a 2022 Maryland State Arts Council Regional Independent Artists Award. His writing has appeared most recently on the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day feature, and in This is the Honey: An Anthology of Contemporary Black Poets. His poems have also been published in New England Review, Poet Lore, Auburn Avenue, Gargoyle, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, and Fledgling Rag; he was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2016 and 2017. He is a member of Cave Canem's (Cah-vay Cah-nem) first cohort of fellows, a former Bread Loaf working scholar, and has attended or been awarded writing residencies at the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Soul Mountain, and Manhattanville College. He has taught English and directed equity and justice work in Washington, D.C.-area independent schools for 20+ years, he lives in Silver Spring with his wife, poet Teri Ellen Cross Davis, and their children.

Upcoming Featured Poets

May 6
Bruce Jacobs
Markus Sanders

June 3
Virginia Crawford
Sam Schmidt

July 1
Tara A. Elliott
Meredith Davies Hadaway

August 5
Hayes Davis
Teri Ellen Cross Davis

October 7
E. Doyle-Gillespie

If you would like to be added to our poetry and prose newsletter, learn more about the poetry meet-up, the poetry open-mic or have any other inquiries regarding poetry at Manor Mill, Please submit the form below!

Meet Our Poetry Hosts

Robert Bowie JR.

Robert Bowie Jr. Is a poet and playwright who has had plays performed in Baltimore and New York. He is the Harvard Alumni Association’s poet, laureate. His poems from his book An Accidental Diary, (for sale on Amazon),have been anthologized and awarded first runner up for the Robert Frost Poetry prize 2022. His blog posts can be found on his website Robertbowiejr.com, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn. He lives with his wife in Monkton.

Mel Edden

Mel Edden is British poet and stay-at-home mom who reads and writes poetry in her spare time. Her recent work has been published in The Loch Raven Review, Maryland Bards Poetry Reviews, Meat For Tea, Gargoyle Magazine and is forthcoming in Welter. She lives in Monkton with her husband and two delightfully rambunctious little Americans. Follow her on Instagram for poetry updates @meledden