An Afternoon with the New England State Poets Laureate

Join the New England Poetry Club on Zoom as we bring the five New England State Poets Laureate for a discussion and reading. We’re delighted to host Julia Bouwsma (Maine), Antoinette Brim-Bell (Connecticut), Colin Channer (Rhode Island), Jennifer Militello (New Hampshire), and Bianca Stone (Vermont). We’ll have an open-ended discussion in which they share their experiences, projects, plans, and initiatives, as well as what drew them to the Poet Laureate position. We’ll also hear their poems! The discussion will be led by two Massachusetts municipal Poets Laureate, Lloyd Schwartz (Somerville) and Lynne Viti (Westwood), who are also members of the NEPC Board of Directors.

Please note that advance registration is required for this event. After you register here, you will receive a personalized Zoom link.

Julia Bouwsma lives off-the-grid in the mountains of western Maine, where she works as a poet, homesteader, editor, teacher, and small-town librarian. She is Maine’s sixth Poet Laureate, currently serving a term from 2021 to 2026, and is the author of three poetry collections: the forthcoming Death Fluorescence (Sundress Publications, 2025), Midden (Fordham University Press, 2018), and Work by Bloodlight (Cider Press Review, 2017). Honors include a 2024 Poet Laureate Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets and two Maine Literary Awards. Her work can be found in various publications, including Ecotone, Green Mountains Review, Kenyon Review, Plume, and Poetry Daily. Bouwsma has taught in the Creative Writing department at the University of Maine at Farmington, serves on the Community Advisory Board for the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance, and works as the Library Director for Webster Library in Kingfield, ME.

Antoinette Brim-Bell (Antoinette Brim), Connecticut’s 8th State Poet Laureate, is the author of three full-length poetry collections:  These Women You Gave Me, Icarus in Love, and Psalm of the Sunflower.   Her poetry has appeared in various journals, magazines, textbooks, and anthologies, as well as in Poetry Magazine and Poem-a-Day.  Brim-Bell has also published critical works, including “The Myopic Eye in Alice Walker’s ‘Flowers’” (Critical Insights: Alice Walker, Salem Press) and “Juxtaposed Dichotomies: the idealized white suburban pastoral, the surrealist tableau of Black Poverty & the Women in between” (The Whiskey of Our Discontent: Gwendolyn Brooks as Conscience and Change Agent, Haymarket Books).  Brim-Bell was nominated for the Pushcart Prize for both poetry and essay.  She is a Cave Canem Foundation Fellow and an alum of Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation (VONA).  A sought-after speaker, editor, educator, and consultant, Brim-Bell is a Professor of English at Capital Community College in Hartford, CT. www.antoinettebrimbell.com

Colin Channer is the State Poet of Rhode Island. Born in Jamaica, he was educated there and in New York. His most recent book is Console (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2023). A book of allusive links between photography, music, sea mammals, mistranslation, and the universal ritual of “the walk,” Console was a New Yorker Best Book of 2023 and a Finalist for the New England Book Award; it was also listed for the PEN/Voelcker. Colin’s honors include a Cullman Fellowship from the New York Public Library, a Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Award from Poets & Writers, and a Henry Merritt Wriston Fellowship from Brown University, where he is Associate Professor & Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Literary Arts. His poems have appeared in Agni, The Atlantic, Conjunctions, Harvard Review, The New Yorker, The Poetry Review, and other venues. 

Jennifer Militello is the Poet Laureate of New Hampshire. She is the author of the forthcoming hybrid collection Identifying the Pathogen, The Pact (Tupelo Press/Shearsman Books, 2021), and the memoir Knock Wood, winner of the Dzanc Nonfiction Prize (Dzanc Books, 2019), as well as four previous collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in Best American Poetry, Best New Poets, American Poetry Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The Paris Review, Poetry, and Tin House. She teaches in the MFA program at New England College.

Bianca Stone is a poet, born and raised in Vermont. She is the author of over five books, including the poetry collections What is Otherwise Infinite (Tin House, 2022), winner of the 2022 Vermont Book Award; The Möbius Strip Club of Grief (Tin House, 2018), Someone Else’s Wedding Vows (Octopus Books and Tin House, 2014) and a collaboration with Anne Carson on the illuminated version of Antigonick (New Directions, 2012). Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Poets and Writers, The Nation, and elsewhere. She co-founded the poetry-based nonprofit Ruth Stone House, where she teaches classes on poetry and poetic study, hosts the Ode & Psyche Podcast, and is editor-at-large for ITERANT magazine. She is the current Vermont poet laureate (2024-2029).