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The Fisherman's Lodge

at the Monkton Hotel

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2029 Monkton Road
Monkton, MD 21111
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Wed – Sun, 12 – 6 PM
(410) 842-5590
info@manor-mill.com
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© 2026 Manor Mill. All rights reserved.

Photos for this website graciously provided by Bo Willse, Zoe Leonard, and many others from the Manor Mill community.

Manor Mill Poetry

with Mel Edden

Poetry Open Mic & Reading Series

Open Mic Poetry is a monthly gathering for poets and poetry lovers at Manor Mill, hosted by British poet Mel Edden. Each month includes a featured poet sharing their published work followed by open mic readings. Every first Monday of each month. Doors open at 6:30pm and readings start 6:45pm.

Open mic readers are capped at 25 per evening, with priority given to first-time readers. Please bring one poem (max three minutes in length, including any introductions). Rehearsing at home is encouraged to ensure clear delivery and accurate length. Featured poets and participants are also encouraged to bring their books for sale.

Poetry Workshops

In addition to open mic nights, Manor Mill hosts poetry workshops with Michael Fallon on the third Saturday of each month, 2:30 - 4:00 PM at Hereford Branch Library.

  • Workshop registration required
  • Email one poem ahead to the workshop leader
  • All skill levels welcome!

Upcoming First Monday Featured Poets

Poetry Night - Moira Egan

Poetry Night - Moira Egan

December 7, 2026

Photo credit Eric Toccaceli

Moira Egan is the author of ten poetry collections, most recently, The Furies (LSU Press, 2025) and Amore e morte, a bilingual New & Selected Poems (Edizioni Tlon, Rome, 2022). Her poems and essays have been published on four continents, in journals such as Poetry, The Hopkins Review, The Yale Review, The Southwest Review, American Letters & Commentary, Nuovi Argomenti, and Poesia, and in anthologies including Best American Poetry; The Book of Forms: A Handbook of Poetics; and Best Spiritual Literature. In 2023, she won the Raiziss/de Palchi Translation Fellowship of the Academy of American Poets for her translations of the poetry of Giorgiomaria Cornelio. She has had poetry fellowships at Civitella Ranieri, the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the James Merrill House. Travelling fellowships have taken her to Malta, Honduras, and Selianitika, Greece. She lives in Rome with Damiano Abeni, her partner in life as well as

Poetry Night - Chrissy Stegman

Poetry Night - Chrissy Stegman

January 4, 2027

Chrissy Stegman is a Baltimore-based poet and writer whose work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Iowa Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Rattle, Cherry Tree, MER, ONE ART, River Heron Review, Stone Circle Review, Gargoyle, and other literary journals.

Chrissy is the winner of the 2025 Ellen Conroy Kennedy Poetry Prize and a recipient of a Best of Rattle Award. Her work was shortlisted for the 2024 DISQUIET Literary Prize.

Her fellowships and scholarships include support from the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing, Kettle Pond, and the Unterberg Poetry Center. In 2026, she received a Poetry Merit Scholarship to the Tinker Mountain Writers’ Workshop at Hollins University and was selected for the Kenyon Review Residential Writing Workshop in Poetry. She also serves as a poetry mentor with the University of Arizona Poetry Center’s Free Time program, working with incarcerated writers.

Find out more about her writing and other art projects at www.chrissystegman.com

Poetry Night - Tonee Mae Moll

Poetry Night - Tonee Mae Moll

February 1, 2027

Dr. Tonee Mae Moll is a queer writer, editor, and educator in Baltimore. Her debut memoir, Out of Step, won the 2018 Lambda Literary Award and the 2017 Non/Fiction Prize. The following year, that book was featured on the American Library Association’s annual list of notable LGBTQ+ books. Her latest poetry collection, You Cannot Save Here, won the Jean Feldman Poetry Prize from Washington Writers’ Publishing House. Mae’s poetry has also received the Adele V. Holden award for creative excellence and the Bill Knott Poetry Prize. She has been a finalist for the Baker Awards, and her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of Net. 

Mae is the executive poetry editor for Mason Jar Press. She holds a PhD in English from Morgan State University and an MFA in creative writing & publishing art from University of Baltimore. 

Poetry Night - G. H. Mosson

Poetry Night - G. H. Mosson

March 1, 2027

G. H. Mosson is the author of three books and three chapbooks of poetry, including Singing the Forge (Wasteland Press 2025), which Midwest Book Review called "not only compelling and accessible, but immersive," Family Snapshot as a Poem in Time (Finishing Line Press, 2019), and two collaborative chapbooks of poetry, Simultaneous Revolutions and Heart X-rays (PM Press). His poetry has appeared in The Tampa Review, California Quarterly, Smartish Pace, BlazeVOX: An Online Journal of Voice, Loch Raven Review, Little Patuxent Review, The Potomac Review, Lines & Stars, and has been nominated four times for the Pushcart Prize. He works as an attorney and lives in Maryland. For more, seek www.ghmosson.com.

Poetry Night - Sue Ellen Thompson

Poetry Night - Sue Ellen Thompson

April 5, 2027

Sue Ellen Thompson is the author of six books, most recently SEA NETTLES: NEW & SELECTED POEMS (Grayson Books, 2022) and the editor of The Autumn House Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry (1st ed.). She has won a Pushcart Prize, the Pablo Neruda/Nimrod Hardman Award, two individual artist’s grants from the State of CT, and a Pulitzer Prize nomination. Thompson teaches at The Writer’s Center in Washington, D.C., and received the 2010 Maryland Author Award from the Maryland Library Association.

Poetry Night - Kathleen Hellen & Barbara Westward-Diehl

Poetry Night - Kathleen Hellen & Barbara Westward-Diehl

May 3, 2027

Kathleen Hellen’s debut collection Umberto’s Night won The Jean Feldman Poetry Prize from Washington Writers’ Publishing House. She is the author of three collections and three poetry chapbooks, most recently from Lily Poetry Review Books, young girl in the flower of time.

Hellen’s poems have appeared in Black Warrior Review, Faultline, Four Way Review, Massachusetts Review, North American Review, Poetry Northwest, Prairie Schooner, West Branch, and elsewhere. Her poetry has won the James Still Award, the Thomas Merton Prize for Poetry of the Sacred, and prizes from the H.O.W. Journal and Washington Square Review.

Poetry Night - Eric Baker

Poetry Night - Eric Baker

June 7, 2027

Eric Baker is a graduate of the University of Maryland’s MFA in Creative Writing, where he now teaches. His work explores the intersection of his Korean and Jewish heritage, as well as legacies of armed conflict. He has been named a finalist for the Alice James Book Award, the Helena Whitehill Award and the Berkshire Prize from Tupelo Press, as well as runner-up for the Desperate Literature Prize. His writing can be found in Gulf Coast, West Trade Review, Tupelo Quarterly, as well as in Painted Bride Quarterly, where he reads poetry and fiction.

Poetry Night - Irene Fick

Poetry Night - Irene Fick

October 4, 2027

Irene Fick of Lewes (DE) is the author of The Fragility of Winter (Broadstone Books, 2025), The Wild Side of the Window (Main Street Rag) and The Stories We Tell (Broadkill Press). The earlier books received first place awards from the National Federation of Press Women. Irene’s poems have been published in such journals as Delmarva Review, Gargoyle, Willawaw Journal and Blue Mountain Review. Her essays have appeared in River Teeth Journal, Hippocampus Magazine, Short Reads and Schuylkill Valley Review. In 2025, she was awarded an Individual Artist Fellowship in creative nonfiction from the Delaware Division of the Arts and the Delaware State Arts Council.  Irene can be reached at irenefickpoet.com

Poetry Night - Erin Murphy

Poetry Night - Erin Murphy

November 1, 2027

Erin Murphy is the author or editor of more than a dozen books, most recently Swoon: New and Selected Poems (Grayson Books, 2026) and Mother as Conjunction: Lyric Essays (Small Harbor Publishing, 2026). A new poetry collection, Domestic Silence, is forthcoming in 2027. Her latest edited volumes are I Witness: Documentary, Witness, and Research-based Poetics (Wesleyan University Press, April 2027) and the open access anthology The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work (Penn State University Libraries, 2026). Her awards include a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Prize, two Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Awards, the Paterson Prize for Literary Excellence, the Foley Poetry Prize, the NYC Big Book Award, the American Book Fest Best Book Award, a Best of the Net award, and two Best Microfiction honors. She is poetry editor of The Summerset Review and professor of English at Penn State University where she has been named the 2026-27 Penn State Laureate. Website: www.erin-murphy.com

Poetry Night - Rachel Eisler & Ann Lolordo

December 6, 2027

Your Host

Mel Edden

Mel Edden

Mel Edden is a British poet who has lived in Maryland for twenty years. Her own poems appear in Gargoyle, The Loch Raven Review, Meat For Tea, WWPH Writes, Welter and in various anthologies. She is a 2025 Best of the Net Nominee and one of Grace Cavalieri's featured poets on FotoSpecchio.com. Mel also edits our anthology Poets of Manor Mill which can be purchased at our gift shop, online and in local bookstores. A Romance languages graduate (Swansea University) and a postgraduate in art education (University of South Wales), Mel has a particular interest in translation, ekphrastic and immigration poetry. She lives in Monkton with her husband and two very fun little Americans. She enjoys swimming, reading and photography and will jump at any opportunity to go to the beach. Find out more, and read her poems, at www.meledden.com

Upcoming

Our latest anthology, Poets of Manor Mill, Volume II, gathers poems from featured poets, open mic participants, and library workshop attendees.

Also available in our gift shop and from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other online booksellers.

Diane “OnWord” Lawrence reading “On the Canal du Midi, Languedoc, France”

Featured Reading

On the Canal du Midi, Languedoc, France

Diane “OnWord” Lawrence

View all recordings

Questions about Poetry Night? Contact us at info@manor-mill.com

Past Featured Poets

Explore

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Past Featured Poets

Published poets at Manor Mill Poetry Night.

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Manor Mill Writers

Manor Mill provides creative opportunities for writers of all levels, fostering community and skill development through poetry, prose, retreats, and more.

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Prose Night

Monthly featured author readings and open mic with the Writers of Manor Mill. Third Monday of every month at 6:45 PM.

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Writers Circle